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Trump sees red in one-word all-caps rage post after court says he can’t stop Alaska’s two Dan Sullivans ballot

Read the original at The Independent ↗
Cite

Feinberg, A. (2026, November 2). Trump sees red in one-word all-caps rage post after court says he can’t stop Alaska’s two Dan Sullivans ballot. The Independent. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/trump-rant-alaska-dan-sullivan-midterms-b3077740.html

Dated from the outlet's own feed. Check the original for its byline.

The Independent · collected 2026-11-02 · by Andrew Feinberg

Quick Summary

President Donald Trump posted an all-caps word "SCAM" on Truth Social after a federal court dismissed his lawsuit challenging Alaska’s U.S Senate race ballot. The lawsuit aimed to prevent certification if Republican incumbent Dan Sullivan loses to Democrat Mary Peltola. Trump argued that the presence of another candidate named Daniel J. Jr. Sullivan could mislead voters into voting for him instead, thus affecting Sullivan's votes. However, Judge Sharon Gleason dismissed the case as baseless and impractical due to voter privacy concerns.
Written by AI on 2026-11-02, from this article's own text only (the story summary below draws on all the coverage).

AI analysis

Story summary

As of November 2, 2026, a federal judge dismissed a Justice Department lawsuit filed by the Trump administration seeking to halt the certification of results in Alaska's Senate race due to concerns over ballot confusion. The lawsuit aimed to delay certification if Republican incumbent Dan Sullivan lost to Democratic candidate Mary Peltola, citing potential voter confusion caused by the presence of another candidate, Daniel J. Sullivan Jr., on the ballot. On October 30, the Justice Department requested that Alaska election officials segregate ballots ranking Sullivan for further investigation into whether such rankings were due to voter confusion. However, attorneys representing Alaska’s Republican-run state government argued on October 31 that the Trump administration's demands were "meritless" and practically impossible to implement without violating voter privacy. Despite the dismissal, the Justice Department announced it would appeal the decision. President Trump reacted with a one-word all-caps post expressing his frustration over the court ruling. The case revolves around allegations by the Justice Department that Democratic operatives recruited Daniel J. Sullivan Jr. as a spoiler candidate to siphon votes from the incumbent Republican senator, potentially undermining voter intent in the closely watched election.

Written for “Judge Tosses Trump and DOJ Lawsuits” on 2026-11-02, grounded in this article and the 23 other(s) covering the same event.
Why this leaning score
The model judged this article politically coded and scored it -0.45, but every quote it verified points right, so the score is not published.
Written under an earlier scoring contract, which gave a paragraph rather than checkable quotes. Re-analysing this article replaces it.
Leaning score withheld for article 123527: score contradicts its own evidence · logged 2026-11-02

Story

📰 Judge Tosses Trump and DOJ Lawsuits
Politics · 24 article(s) covering the same event. Compare every outlet's account →

Compared with similar articles

This article reads unscored and hedges 6% of its claims. Each row says how that neighbour differs.
NBC News
⚖️ Leans right Hedges 0 of 6 claims Outlet record 60/100
“Article A describes the Justice Department's request to separate ballots ranking Dan J. Sullivan, while Article B reports on President Trump's reaction after a court decision against his lawsuit to block certification of Alaska’s Senate race ballot.”
The Straits Times
⚖️ Leans right Hedges 5 of 28 claims Outlet record 66/100
“The articles describe different specific events: one is about the acceleration of criminal probes into the Senate race, and the other is about Trump's reaction to a court decision regarding ballot certification.”
Daily Mail
⚖️ Leans left Hedges 6 of 22 claims Outlet record 69/100
Washington Examiner
Hedges 0 of 4 claims Outlet record 70/100
“The articles describe different moments in time: one is about Trump's demand to remove certain candidates from the ballot, while the other describes his reaction after a court decision that he cannot stop the certification of Alaska’s U.S. Senate race.”
CBS News
Hedges 0 of 1 claims Outlet record 66/100
“Article A describes Trump speaking to reporters about the two Dan Sullivans on the ballot, while Article B details his reaction after a court decision and subsequent social media post regarding the same issue.”
New York Post
⚖️ Leans left Hedges 0 of 11 claims Outlet record 66/100
“While both articles discuss Trump's efforts to challenge the certification of Alaska’s Senate race, Article A focuses on attorneys dismissing the lawsuit as meritless, while Article B reports on Trump's social media reaction after the court decision.”
New York Post
Hedges 3 of 35 claims Outlet record 66/100
“Article A reports on the court decision to toss out the lawsuit, while Article B focuses on Trump's reaction to this court decision through social media.”
CBS News
Hedges 0 of 26 claims Outlet record 66/100
“Article A describes Trump's reaction to the initial report of election scheme, while Article B covers his response after a court decision allowing certification of the ballot despite the controversy.”
Al Jazeera
Hedges 4 of 25 claims Outlet record 60/100
“Article A describes Trump's demand for the removal and prosecution of Alaska Senate race candidates, while Article B reports on Trump's reaction to a court decision regarding the certification of the ballot. Although related, they describe different specific incidents.”
Daily Mail
Hedges 0 of 7 claims Outlet record 69/100
“While both articles discuss Trump's reaction to events surrounding the Alaska Senate race, they describe different reactions at distinct times and in different contexts.”
How this article was measured signals, leaning charts, publisher record, byline, topics and claims

Signals How these are calculated →

Claims extracted
16
sentences that state something as happening or true
Uncertain
6%
1 of 16 hedged ("reportedly", "may", "according to")
Leaning
withheld
no quote in the article backed the model's score
Publisher signals
59/100
The Independent's corrections and hedging, across everything collected from it. Not a measure of accuracy.
Outlets on this story
24
Politics
Same framing elsewhere
1
articles that frame the event the way this one does
Analyzed 2026-11-02 · how these are computed

How this is being covered How these are calculated →

Article leaning vs. publisher reliability
Source leaning vs. consistency

Publisher

The Independent · 3553 article(s) · 9 correction(s) detected
Running correction rate · 9 correction(s)

Who wrote this

Andrew Feinberg
29 article(s) here · 1 carrying a prediction
🔮 Trump has baselessly suggested that Alaska voters are so ignorant that they would not know the meaning of the word “incumbent” and the presence of the second Sullivan on the ballot led Trump to push for legal action over concerns that votes intended for the incumbent would be siphoned away.
🔮 With days to go until what polls indicate will be a brutal midterm election for President Donald Trump and his Republican Party, the man who has implored MAGA voters to “pretend I’m on the ballot” is starting to panic.
🔮 Who could have guessed that Trump would get so spun up over a law that’s been on the books since Abraham Lincoln was president?
🔮 “Well, I guess you could say for that particular purpose, for the purpose of allowing a man who was thinking he was going to be in prison for life out.
🔮 “Well, I guess you could say for that particular purpose, for the purpose of allowing a man who was thinking he was going to be in prison for life out.
🔮 Who could have guessed that Trump would get so spun up over a law that’s been on the books since Abraham Lincoln was president?
🔮 It didn’t take Susie Wiles more than a few day to put a stop to the buzz in Washington that predicted her time as chief of staff was up.
🔮 President Donald Trump said on Monday that the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool is “70% filled with water and looking good” and warned that anyone who damages it again “will GO TO JAIL,” even though federal prosecutors appointed by Trump himself have told a court the pool’s lining was ruined by a botched installation and not by vandals.
🔮 You think about it, but I wouldn’t reconsider.
🔮 He reportedly has found no shortage of people willing to encourage him to dump his loyal aide overboard, with one GOP operative noting that Wiles has “burned a lot of people” in her time leading Trump’s administration.
Also by Andrew Feinberg
Nothing else under this byline is closely related to this article, so these are simply their most recent.
All 29 articles by Andrew Feinberg →

Topics

Alaska GOP Republican Senate U.S. Senate

Subjects

Sullivan PERSON · 6× Peltola PERSON · 5× Alaska GPE · 4× Trump PERSON · 4× Dan Sullivan PERSON · 3× Republican NORP · 2× Donald Trump PERSON · 1× GOP ORG · 1× Senate ORG · 1× U.S. Senate ORG · 1×

Narrative

"More fundamentally, the United States provides no workable plan as to how it proposes to segregate ballots cast for Daniel J. Sullivan on Election Day and then conduct a court-ordered unspecified 'investigation' of those ballots in a manner that would preserve voter secrecy
framing: assertive · carried by 1 article(s) · first seen 2026-11-02
🔮 Trump has baselessly suggested that Alaska voters are so ignorant that they would not know the meaning of the word “incumbent” and the presence of the second Sullivan on the ballot led Trump to push for legal action over concerns that votes intended for the incumbent would be siphoned away.

Claims (16 extracted, 1 hedged)

President Donald Trump on Monday lashed out with a monosyllabic Truth Social post decrying the federal court decision tossing out a lawsuit intended to block the certification of Alaska’s U.S. Senate race should Republican incumbent Dan Sullivan lose. asserted
Sullivan → lash → race
The president’s post included no text save for an all-caps, large-type label applied atop an image of Alaska’s senate ballot labelling the ballot a “SCAM.” asserted
post → include → ballot
The Senate contest in the Last Frontier pits GOP incumbent Dan Sullivan against Mary Peltola, who previously held Alaska’s lone at-large House seat. asserted
who → pit → seat
Polls have shown Peltola with a narrow lead over Sullivan, and Trump has spent days railing against the conduct of that race over the presence of a second candidate on the ballot who shares the incumbent senator’s name. asserted
who → show → name
The state’s ranked-choice ballot lists the current senator with his middle initial as “Sullivan, Dan S” with notations that he is a “Registered Republican” and the incumbent. asserted
he → rank → notations
The other similarly-named candidate is listed above him as “Sullivan, Daniel J. Jr” without any party identification. asserted
candidate → name → identification
Trump has baselessly suggested that Alaska voters are so ignorant that they would not know the meaning of the word “incumbent” and the presence of the second Sullivan on the ballot led Trump to push for legal action over concerns that votes intended for the incumbent would be siphoned away. uncertain
votes → suggest → incumbent
His Truth Social tantrum comes less than a day after U.S District Judge Sharon Gleason dismissed a lawsuit which demanded an investigation into whether votes cast for the second Dan Sullivan, a retired teacher, were instead meant to be for the incumbent senator. asserted
votes → come → senator
State officials called the suit baseless, arguing it would be impossible to make such a determination without breaching voter privacy. asserted
it → call → privacy
And in her ruling the judge agreed, writing that the remedies the federal government requested were "infeasible" given the high volume of votes already cast. asserted
government → agree → votes
"More fundamentally, the United States provides no workable plan as to how it proposes to segregate ballots cast for Daniel J. Sullivan on Election Day and then conduct a court-ordered unspecified 'investigation' of those ballots in a manner that would preserve voter secrecy asserted
that → provide → secrecy
," she wrote. asserted
she → write → ?
Last week, The New York Times reported that Peltola’s campaign was connected to efforts to entice the second Sullivan to enter the race, though Sullivan said in June that he’d had no communications with the Peltola campaign about his candidacy. asserted
he → report → candidacy
Peltola’s campaign has denied involvement in a statement, and Peltola herself has said she is “not interested in tricking voters.” asserted
she → deny → voters
State courts, including the Alaska Supreme Court, previously rejected Republican challenges to remove the retired teacher from the August open primary ballot. asserted
courts → include → ballot
Republicans, including allies of Trump, also have a long track record of supporting decoy candidates in political races. asserted
Republicans → include → races
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