Trump's absurd election interference attempt in one state could doom us all

Sorry to intrude on your inbox again today, but Trump’s attempt to overturn any results of the 2026 election he dislikes took a sharp turn toward authoritarianism when the Justice Department today asked a federal court to block certification of the Senate election in Alaska if the Republican incumbent narrowly loses.

The Department argues that confusion over a candidate on the ballot with a name very similar to that of the incumbent, Senator Dan S. Sullivan, could taint the election result.

This is absurd.

1. The federal government has absolutely no authority under the U.S. Constitution to tell Alaska when and how to certify its votes. It’s up to state law, and Alaska’s state officials are following Alaska state law. In June, the Alaska Supreme Court ruled that the second Mr. Sullivan could appear on the ballot, ahead of the primary.

2. To add authoritarian insult to democratic injury, Trump made it clear that he had demanded the lawsuit. “I’m the one that said do it,” he told reporters.

Since when does a president of the United States have authority to order the Justice Department to block certification in a senatorial race if a Democrat wins — and do this only 11 days before Election Day? In simple fact, no president can do this, but Trump has never been stopped by norms or rules.

3. Finally, there’s little doubt that this lawsuit is intended to cast doubt on the integrity of elections all over America — and to delay final tallies.

The Department argues that if the incumbent Republican loses and it appears he might have won but for the other Mr. Sullivan on the ballot, then the vote should not be certified until “an investigation to determine whether votes cast for Daniel J. Sullivan were meant to be cast for Senator Sullivan and any further procedures or relief this court deems necessary and appropriate.”

How the hell would such an investigation even be undertaken, since ballots are cast anonymously?

If this judicial tactic works, we can expect it all over the country — interminable investigations to determine whether votes cast for Democratic candidates were “meant” to be cast for Republicans.

We’ve been through this before. Trump has tried this before. Remember 2021?

I find this a very worrisome sign. It suggests that Todd Blanche — who was confirmed as Attorney General in August — is willing to interfere in a federal election if Trump wants him to do so.

It increases the likelihood that Trump will order Blanche and the Justice Department to make a similar move in California, where the Department has escalated its claims that thousands of noncitizens are illegally registered to vote and demanded that California set aside ballots from suspected noncitizens.

Trump and his regime have made similar claims against other states. And, of course, Trump has long claimed, despite evidence showing otherwise, that he lost the 2020 election because of mass voter fraud by noncitizens.

I hope (1) the Supreme Court dismisses this case as soon as possible, and signals it will treat any similar cases against other states the same way, (2) when and if Democrats take control of the House, they impeach Todd Blanche, and (3) the New York State bar, where Todd Blanche is licensed to practice law, immediately takes steps to disbar him.

Court records and analyses by election experts has shown that illegal voting, including by noncitizens, is exceedingly rare. So far, the second Trump administration has charged about 150 people across the United States with illegal voting or voting registration.

If Democratic senate candidate Mary Peltola wins the Senate seat by a significant margin, votes for the other Dan Sullivan might not be consequential. She earned nearly 15,000 more votes than Senator Dan Sullivan in the primary, so the 4,000 that the other Sullivan received would not have made a difference — even if all of them would otherwise have gone to the senator. (And Alaska’s ranked-choice voting could also lessen the impact of a spoiler candidate.)

• Robert Reich is an emeritus professor of public policy at Berkeley and former secretary of labor. His writings can be found at https://robertreich.substack.com/. His new memoir, Coming Up Short, can be found wherever you buy books. You can also support local bookstores nationally by ordering the book at bookshop.org