LEFT: Screenshot via @mary_peltola on YouTube RIGHT: AP Photo/Jae C. Hong
Former Rep. Mary Peltola (D-AK) is distancing herself from an endorsement by former Vice President Kamala Harris as she looks to flip a Senate seat in Alaska, according to a Friday New York Times report.
In a Wednesday fundraising email from Harris’s Fight for the People PAC, the former vice president encouraged supporters to “contribute $10 or whatever you can afford,” adding, “If there’s anyone who can flip Alaska and secure the Senate majority for Democrats – it’s Mary.”
As the Times noted, Harris lost Alaska by 14 percentage points to President Donald Trump in 2024.
Republicans quickly seized on the endorsement, with the outlet citing a statement from Nick Puglia, a spokesman for the National Republican Senatorial Committee, in which he accused the former congresswoman of having worked “hand in hand with Kamala Harris to put Alaska last, so it’s no surprise that Harris is backing Peltola.”
Peltola’s campaign, however, rejected the association, telling the Times that it had not approved Harris’s fundraising email and had no knowledge of it before it was sent. Not to mention, the then-congresswoman chose not to endorse Harris in 2024.
“Mary isn’t seeking endorsements from anyone from the Lower 48 — her focus is and always will be Alaska,” the campaign said, pointing instead to the support Peltola has received from labor groups in the state.
Nate Adams, a spokesman for Sen. Dan Sullivan (R-AK), whom Peltola is running to unseat, also sought to saddle Peltola with Harris’s support, telling the Times in a statement, “No matter how hard Mary Peltola tries to hide from the endorsement, Alaskans can see exactly whose team she and Kamala Harris are on.”
Yet independent Alaska state Rep. Rebecca Himschoot defended the Democratic candidate, describing Harris’s email as “really dumb.”
“She’s riding Mary Peltola’s coattails,” Himschoot told the Times. “And she’s not even running for anything that anyone knows of yet, and didn’t do well here to begin with.”
The post Democratic Senate Candidate Rejects Kamala Harris Endorsement first appeared on Mediaite.
