A mysterious network is urging conservatives to abandon Republican candidates in critical Senate races in favor of long-shot alternatives.
In Alaska, ads tell voters to reject Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan for being insufficiently conservative and opt for an obscure Republican challenger.
A similar playbook is underway in Ohio, where ads tell conservatives to ditch Republican Sen. Jon Husted and back a third-party candidate.
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Campaign finance records reveal the PACs running the crafty ads share some personnel and have used the same media firms. One of them has already disclosed left-wing funding sources.
An ad by Alaska Values PAC tells voters Mr. Sullivan is not a true conservative and says he’s allied with GOP Sen. Lisa Murkowski, who often defies President Trump.
“Lisa Murkowski’s the traitor who voted to convict Trump. She and Sullivan both vote for wasteful spending and giveaways. Alaska’s already got one Lisa Murkowski; we don’t need two,” it says.
The ad instructs voters to “only rank” Gerald Heikes, a Republican candidate it calls “a true conservative.”
Republicans see the ad as part of a larger scheme to sabotage Mr. Sullivan’s chances in a highly competitive race with Democratic candidate Mary Peltola.
Under Alaska’s ranked-choice voting system, Republican voters who exclude Mr. Sullivan from their ballot could endanger his chances of reelection.
“Mary Peltola’s allies are paying for this ad, and the same Peltola-aligned Democrat operative at the center of her scheme to deceptively recruit candidates into this race is the same operative running this dark money super PAC,” said Nate Adams, spokesman for the Sullivan campaign, in a statement to The Washington Times.
GOP-aligned groups similarly backed Democratic candidates in the lead-up to the Alaska primary, none of whom made the ballot.
Alaska Values PAC did not respond to a request for comment.
SEE ALSO: Dan Sullivan vs. Dan Sullivan: Alaska governor orders probe into Peltola Senate campaign
Mr. Heikes, the candidate backed by the PAC, is a drywall contractor and told The New York Times in an interview that he was recruited to run for the Senate “by a guy from the Midwest” who approached him. He said he didn’t remember the man’s name.
Mr. Heikes made it onto the ballot after placing fourth in Alaska’s nonpartisan primary.
The New York Times reported that Jerid Kurtz, a Democratic operative from Ohio, sought to recruit additional Republican candidates to get on the ballot to split the Republican vote, including another candidate named Dan Sullivan.
Mr. Kurtz’s social media pages have been deleted since the NYT’s reporting.
Ms. Peltola has said she’s “not interested in tricking voters” in response to reports that her campaign was aware of the apparent ballot-stacking scheme.
Alaska Values PAC, formed in early September, won’t have to disclose its funding until after the election.
However, federal filings show it shares a treasurer with Right for Alaska, a now-terminated PAC that also ran ads in favor of Mr. Heikes.
Both PACs used the same media firm to reach voters via text.
Right for Alaska PAC was funded by the Sixteen Thirty Fund, a left-wing nonprofit that declares its support for “leaders and causes that share our progressive values,” such as “racial justice” and “confronting climate change.”
Another major funder was Liberty Force Action Fund, a Virginia-based nonprofit with no public web presence.
Despite its left-wing funding, Right for Alaska ran an ad accusing Sen. Sullivan of backing “sex change surgeries for children” and “DEI programs,” and recommended a vote for Mr. Heikes instead.
In Ohio’s Senate race, the same strategy has been replicated by a group with striking organizational similarities that seeks to peel away votes from Mr. Husted.
Buckeye Freedom PAC is a new group formed in October, which at one point shared the same treasurer as the two Alaska PACs.
It also used one of the same media firms for voter outreach as the Alaska PACs.
The group questions Mr. Husted’s conservative bona fides in one ad by comparing him to Gov. Mike DeWine, a moderate Republican who appointed him to the Senate, a similar strategy to the one used against Sen. Sullivan.
“Let’s ditch Husted and DeWine,” says the narrator in an ad that accuses Mr. Husted of giving illegal immigrants taxpayer money.
The ad concludes by endorsing Libertarian candidate William Redpath, whom it describes as “a constitutional conservative.”
Mr. Redpath is hardly an immigration hawk himself.
His website says he agrees with a Cato Institute scholar that “all immigration should be allowed except for a handful of people.”
Tom Evans, the press secretary for Mr. Husted’s campaign, said in a statement about the ad, “The illegal immigration accusations are a joke.”
The outside groups did not immediately respond to requests for comment on their funding and goals.
Election Day is Tuesday.
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