But What Can You Do? tracks where 2026 candidates stand on U.S. weapons and funding for the government of Israel. How we check

Daniel J. Sullivan Jr.

✗

How this mark works

We track key votes on sending U.S. weapons and money to the government of Israel. A check means every tracked vote they cast came down against sending more, on the side of peace and de-escalation. A question mark means a mixed record: they sided with sending up to half of the time. An X means they voted to send more weapons and money in over half of their tracked votes, even as the way those weapons and dollars were being used became more and more obvious. At exactly half, money this election cycle from a lobbying group we track, or an endorsement from a group that backs sending weapons, makes it an X. Only votes actually cast are counted. Where a candidate has no recorded votes on these bills, the mark comes instead from a reviewed reading of their public record (money from the lobbying groups we track, endorsements, and their own words since January 26, 2024). There an X also covers fully backing the conduct of the war by the government of Israel without significant reservations, and a question mark also covers speaking about Israel without saying clearly where they stand on U.S. weapons and funding. A dash means No Position Found: we found nothing in their own words about Israel, Gaza or the war.

See a dash? Ask the candidate where they stand, then send us their answer and we'll review it and update the mark. Or volunteer to help review candidates.

Two reviewers, reading the public record as a whole, agree: Asked to finish "U.S. military aid to Israel should be", he wrote "Carefully appropriated": the aid continues, with care, and he names no condition, cut or pause. Reviewed by hand on 2026-09-28. This candidate has no recorded tracked floor votes.

Asked to complete the sentence "U.S. military aid to Israel should be", Sullivan Jr. answered "Carefully appropriated", and said the subject needs more than twenty words. Nothing of his reaches U.S. aid to Palestinians (research).

✉ Copy a message to send them

We don’t have a campaign email on file yet. Copy this message and send it through their website or a public social account.

If you send this from your own email, cc replies@butwhatcanyoudo.org so we can post their answer.

Your record on weapons and funding for the government of Israel [ref: ak-sen-sullivan-jr]

Dear Daniel J. Sullivan Jr.,

Before I vote in November, I want to ask you directly: have you reconsidered your support for sending weapons and funding to the government of Israel?

A United Nations commission has found that crimes against humanity have been committed in Gaza, including the use of starvation as a method of war. Gaza's Health Ministry counts more than 70,000 Palestinians killed, and a study in The Lancet Global Health found about 25,000 more violent deaths than the official count in the first 15 months alone.

We said "never again." Your record reads as cheering for "again." Is that how you want to be remembered?

I'd like to know where you stand now. I may share your answer publicly so other voters can see it.

Respectfully,
[Your name]

Deep Dive

Daniel J. Sullivan Jr. is a retired elementary school teacher from Petersburg, a Republican, and one of four names on Alaska's ballot for the U.S. Senate on November 3, 2026. He is not the senator of almost the same name, who is also on that ballot and is also a Republican; they are two different people and nothing on this card belongs to the other one. He worked for the U.S. Forest Service in surveying and timber management before he trained as a teacher, and he taught for twenty years. The state tried to keep him off the primary ballot on the argument that his name would confuse voters; he denied it, went to court, and the Alaska Supreme Court ruled on June 29, 2026 that he had to be allowed to run. He took 2.5 percent of the vote on August 18 and finished third.

His answer on this subject is short and it is his own. Alaska Public Media, KTOO, the Alaska Beacon and the Anchorage Daily News put a joint questionnaire to every candidate for this seat, and one item asked each of them to complete, in five to twenty words, the sentence "U.S. military aid to Israel should be". He published his own answers on his campaign site on July 13, 2026 and his reads: "Carefully appropriated. However, addressing the complexity of geopolitics in the Middle East requires more than 5- 20 words." The guide the four news organizations published carries the same answer in a shorter form, "thoughtfully appropriated."

Read for what it settles, it settles one thing: he would keep American military aid going to the government of Israel and take care over how it is voted through. It sets no condition, names no weapon and no sum, and asks for no increase and no cut. The same form asked him the same question about Ukraine and he answered "Increased and consistent", so the form was capable of drawing a direction out of him and on this question it did not.

There is nothing else. His campaign site is a handful of pages, two press releases and six short posts, and this is the only place in any of them that reaches the subject. He also published his answers to a League of Women Voters questionnaire, which asked about the country's three biggest challenges, immigration enforcement, protecting democracy and the checks on presidential power; his answers reach the Middle East once, in the sentence that tariffs and "an ill conceived war in Iran have spiked energy and commodity prices", which is about prices at home rather than about what America sends. On U.S. aid to Palestinians he has said nothing at all, and he has not characterized the war in Gaza.

You are better placed to get the rest of it than we are. Ask Sullivan Jr. directly, or at a candidate forum, and send us the reply: it goes on this page in his own words, which is worth more than anything we could write about him.

In their words

“Carefully appropriated. However, addressing the complexity of geopolitics in the Middle East requires more than 5- 20 words.”

Source ↗, 2026-07-13

Research log

The notes behind this card: what we looked at, what we found, and where each item came from.

Every page named below was opened and read on 2026-09-20 unless the entry says otherwise. His campaign site was read in full, every page and every post on it. Bands: Position (2024-01-26 onward), Reaction window (2023-10-07 to 2024-01-25), Earlier record (before 2023-10-07), Undated. He has never held federal office, so none of the congressional votes this site tracks are his, and the committees this site tracks record no funding on this record.

U.S. military aid and weapons to the government of Israel

[Position, 2026-07-13] The one answer of his on this subject, and it is in his own words on his own site. Alaska Public Media, KTOO, the Alaska Beacon and the Anchorage Daily News built a joint candidate questionnaire for this year's election, and one item asked each candidate to complete, in five to twenty words, the sentence "U.S. military aid to Israel should be ____". Under the heading "Candidate Questionnaire from Alaska Public Media", his post of July 13, 2026 gives his answer as: "Carefully appropriated. However, addressing the complexity of geopolitics in the Middle East requires more than 5- 20 words." The post's own published date reads 2026-07-13.
[Position, read 2026-09-20] The published guide carries the same answer in the shorter form the form's word limit calls for: "thoughtfully appropriated." The two wordings differ in the adverb and in the second sentence, which the guide does not carry; both were read directly, and the research page and the card carry both so a reader can see the difference. The guide has no date of its own and is dated here to the day it was read; his own copy of the answers is dated July 13, 2026.
What the answer does and does not settle. It keeps American military aid going to the government of Israel and asks for care in how it is appropriated. It sets no condition, names no weapon system and no sum, and calls for neither an increase nor a cut. Nothing of his was found on Foreign Military Financing, on the memorandum of understanding, on arms sales or on an embargo.
[Position, 2026-07-13] The same form put the same question about Ukraine, and his answer there has a direction in it: "Increased and consistent. Not only are Ukrainians fighting a brutal aggressor, they are weakening a regime that is hostile to the United States. A victory for Ukraine is a victory for America and the world." The published guide carries it as "increased and consistent". Ukraine is a different question and no position of his on Ukraine is claimed here; the pairing is recorded because it is the same form, the same sentence to finish, and it shows that the form could draw a direction out of him.

U.S. aid to Palestinians

Nothing located, at any date. Neither the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, nor humanitarian funding for Gaza, nor the aid pipeline appears anywhere on his campaign site, in either of the two questionnaires he has published, in his press releases, in the published voter guide, on his Ballotpedia page, or in any report of his campaign read for this card.

Characterization of the conflict

Nothing located, at any date. He has not been found using the words genocide, apartheid, self-defense or terrorism about the war in Gaza, and nothing of his was found on Palestinian statehood, a two-state framework or territorial boundaries. The words Israel, Gaza, Palestinian and Hamas occur nowhere on his campaign site except in the one questionnaire answer above and inside a country list on a form.
[Position, 2026-07-31] The nearest thing to a regional statement is in his answers to a League of Women Voters questionnaire, published on his site on July 31, 2026. Asked for the country's three biggest challenges, his third names rising household costs and says: "Tariffs applied haphazardly, and an ill conceived war in Iran have spiked energy and commodity prices immediately with no respite in sight." That is about prices in the United States, and Iran is a different question from what America sends the government of Israel or sends Palestinians.
[Position, 2026-09-01] The same point again in his post of September 1, 2026, on staying in the race after the primary: "We are involved in an ill-conceived war with Iran and a bewildering trade war with Canada. Gasoline, food, housing and medical costs seem to increase daily." The Anchorage Daily News quoted the same statement that day. Out of scope for the same reason.

Related rhetoric and lobbying

Nothing located on the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, on any other advocacy organization working on this subject, or on money connected to any of them.
[Position, 2026-07-31] He does have a general position on political money, in the League of Women Voters answers: "I would support efforts to overturn Citizen United. The abuse of campaign financing has spiraled to where it feels like elections are simply between large PACs and billionaires competing for their own self interest." It names no organization, and a view about campaign money is not a position on what the United States sends anyone. Ballotpedia's summary of federal disclosures records $18,835 raised and $10,435 spent by his campaign in this cycle.

Safety and antisemitism (context, not a position on what America sends)

Nothing located, at any date. Nothing of his addresses antisemitism or the safety of any religious community.

What the campaign site and his own pages say

[Read 2026-09-20] His campaign site was read in full and is small: a home page that is his biography, a donate page, a privacy page, a press page carrying two releases dated May 29 and June 11, 2026, a links page carrying one address, and a blog of six posts dated July 13, July 31, August 24, September 1, September 8 and September 15, 2026. A search of all of it for israel, gaza, palestin, hamas, antisemit, jewish, zionis, aipac, unrwa, foreign aid, foreign policy, military aid, middle east, weapon and arms returns the one questionnaire answer set out above, the Middle East sentence attached to it, and nothing else; the only other matches sit inside a country list on the site's own contact form.
[Read 2026-09-20] The six posts, in order: his answers to the joint news organizations' questionnaire; his answers to the League of Women Voters questionnaire; a post on what makes a good leader; his statement on staying in the race after the primary; a post on ferry service to Petersburg; and a note that he recorded a video for a schools mock election run by Anchorage Youth Vote, with the link still to come. Only the first two reach any foreign subject.
[Read 2026-09-20] The two press releases are about his entry into the race and about the attempt to remove him from the ballot. Neither reaches this subject.
[Read 2026-09-20] His entry in the joint voter guide answers twenty-one items in full, from his age and occupation to the Ambler road, salmon management, Medicaid work requirements, abortion, Israel, Ukraine and mass shootings. He used the whole range of the form, so the shortness of the Israel answer is his own choice and not a blank.
[Read 2026-09-20] Ballotpedia's page for him records that he has not completed its Candidate Connection survey. It carries no statement of his on this subject and lists no issue positions.

The race

[Read 2026-09-20] The general election for Alaska's Class 2 seat in the U.S. Senate is on November 3, 2026 and is decided by ranked choice voting, for the second time in a Senate general election in Alaska. Ballotpedia's page for the race gives the field: "Incumbent Daniel S. Sullivan (R), Mary Peltola (D), Gerald Heikes (R), and Dan Sullivan (R) are running in the general election for U.S. Senate Alaska on November 3, 2026." The record holds the same four: Dan S. Sullivan, the Republican incumbent; Mary Peltola, the Democrat; Gerald Heikes, a Republican; and Daniel J. Sullivan Jr., a Republican.
[Read 2026-09-20] The open primary was held on August 18, 2026 and the results were certified on August 31, 2026. Ballotpedia's certified table reads Mary Peltola 49.5 percent and 82,244 votes, Daniel S. Sullivan 41.4 percent and 68,726, Dan Sullivan 2.5 percent and 4,107, David Leslie 1.1 percent and 1,850, and Gerald Heikes 1.0 percent and 1,741, out of 166,004 votes cast among sixteen candidates. David Leslie, the Democrat who finished fourth, withdrew on the day the results were certified, and Gerald Heikes, who finished fifth, took the place that opened, as the Anchorage Daily News reported on September 1, 2026.
[Read 2026-09-20] The two Sullivans, and how to tell them apart. This candidate is Daniel J. Sullivan Jr. of Petersburg, born in Evergreen Park, Illinois, a former U.S. Forest Service employee and a retired teacher, aged 69, whose campaign site is sullivanforsenate.com. The other is Dan S. Sullivan, the sitting senator first elected in 2014, whose campaign site is dansullivanforalaska.com. Wikipedia's article on the race records that they are not related. In June 2026 the Alaska Division of Elections moved to keep this candidate off the primary ballot after Republican groups alleged he had entered the race to confuse voters; he denied it, a superior court judge ruled in his favor, and on June 29, 2026 the Alaska Supreme Court ordered that he be allowed to run, leaving it to the Division of Elections to decide how his name would appear. Alaska Public Media reported on August 3, 2026 that on the primary ballot he appeared as "Daniel J. Sullivan Jr." with no party designation beside his name, while the senator was labeled as the incumbent. Every source used on this card was checked against that chain, and nothing belonging to the senator is on it.
[Read 2026-09-20] Two profiles of his campaign were read and neither reaches this subject: Alaska Public Media's account of his policies, by Taylor Heckart of KFSK, published August 3, 2026, which covers affordable housing, health care, the cost of living, tariffs, cuts to federal agencies and his support for the open primary; and its report of September 1, 2026 that he is staying in the race. The Alaska Independent's account of where the four candidates stand, published September 9, 2026, records that neither Sullivan campaign answered its questions and quotes his campaign site on the war with Iran.
The other three candidates' records belong on their own cards and are not narrated here.

Places that could not be read, so nothing is claimed from them

His statement in the state's election pamphlet, at https://elections.alaska.gov/doc/oep/2026/SULLIVAN,%20DANIEL%20J.%20JR%20_US%20Sen_Eng_06.30.26-PWEB . The state's document service refuses every request made here, and so does the pamphlet index. Nothing is claimed from it. It is a short candidate statement in his own words and would be worth a look by anyone who can open it.
The video he says he recorded for Anchorage Youth Vote's schools mock election. His post of September 15, 2026 says the recording answers questions written by students and that the link is coming; no link had been posted when this card was written.

Not on the card, and why

His sentences about the war with Iran, in the League of Women Voters answers and in his September 1, 2026 post. Iran is a different question from what the United States sends the government of Israel or sends Palestinians, and both sentences are about prices in the United States. Quoted on this page with their addresses.
His full Ukraine answer. Ukraine is a different question. The three words the card quotes from it are there only to show what the same form drew out of him on the same day, and no position of his on Ukraine is claimed anywhere.
His view on campaign money and on the Citizens United decision. A view about how campaigns are funded is not a position on what the United States sends any government, and it names no organization.
The rest of both questionnaires and of his campaign site: housing, health care, the cost of living, tariffs, immigration, elections and voter data, the checks on presidential power, the Ambler road, salmon, Medicaid work requirements, abortion, mass shootings, ferry service to Petersburg and leadership. Out of scope, and listed so the absence on this subject can be checked.
Everything about the court case and the two candidates' names. It is how he came to be on the ballot, not a position, and it is set out under the race above.
The records of Dan S. Sullivan, Mary Peltola and Gerald Heikes. Another candidate's positions belong on that candidate's own card.

Sources retrieved for this card (address; opened or could not open; date)

https://www.sullivanforsenate.com/ and every page and post on it (opened; 2026-09-20)
https://www.sullivanforsenate.com/new-blog/a-sneak-preview/a-sneak-preview (opened; 2026-09-20; published 2026-07-13)
https://www.sullivanforsenate.com/new-blog/a-sneak-preview/league-of-women-voter-questionnaire (opened; 2026-09-20; published 2026-07-31)
https://www.sullivanforsenate.com/new-blog/a-sneak-preview/moving-forward (opened; 2026-09-20; published 2026-09-01)
https://www.sullivanforsenate.com/press (opened; 2026-09-20; two releases, 2026-05-29 and 2026-06-11)
https://alaskapublic.org/news/2026-alaska-primary#/alaska-us-senate/candidate/dan-j-sullivan-jr (opened; 2026-09-20; his entry in the joint 2026 voter guide)
https://ballotpedia.org/Dan_Sullivan_%28Alaska_U.S._Senate_candidate%29 (opened; 2026-09-20)
https://alaskapublic.org/news/politics/elections/2026-08-03/petersburgs-dan-j-sullivan-will-be-on-the-ballot-for-u-s-senate-what-are-his-policies (opened; 2026-09-20; published 2026-08-03)
https://alaskapublic.org/news/politics/elections/2026-09-01/petersburgs-dan-j-sullivan-stays-on-alaskas-u-s-senate-ballot-after-third-place-primary-finish (opened; 2026-09-20; published 2026-09-01)
https://www.adn.com/politics/2026/09/01/alaskas-4th-place-us-senate-finisher-drops-out-elevating-gop-candidate-to-ballot/ (opened; 2026-09-20; published 2026-09-01)
https://alaskaindependentnews.com/elections/where-the-alaska-us-senate-candidates-stand-on-the-issues/ (opened; 2026-09-20; published 2026-09-09)
https://ballotpedia.org/United_States_Senate_election_in_Alaska,_2026 (opened; 2026-09-20)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_United_States_Senate_election_in_Alaska (opened; 2026-09-20)
https://elections.alaska.gov/doc/oep/2026/SULLIVAN,%20DANIEL%20J.%20JR%20_US%20Sen_Eng_06.30.26-PWEB (could not open; 2026-09-20)
This is a record of what was checked on 2026-09-20, not a claim that no other statement exists.

Also in this race

✗ Mary Peltola (Democrat)
✗ Dan Sullivan (Republican)
✗ Gerald L. Heikes (Republican)

All Alaska candidates.