Mary Peltola’s Alaska Senate campaign is making one thing clear: it does not want Kamala Harris’s backing to become part of its 2026 political story.
Peltola, who is seeking one of Alaska’s two US Senate seats in November’s midterm elections, moved quickly to create distance after Harris promoted her candidacy in a recent fundraising email.
‘Mary isn’t seeking endorsements from anyone from the Lower 48 — her focus is and always will be Alaska,’ a campaign spokesperson told The New York Times.
The aide also said Peltola had not signed off on Harris’s message, which appeared in a fundraising appeal declaring: ‘If there’s anyone who can flip Alaska and secure the Senate majority for Democrats — it’s Mary.’
Harris’s support may carry complications in Alaska, a state she lost by 14 points during the 2024 presidential race.
Republicans have already seized on the endorsement, hoping to turn Harris’s poor performance in the state into a political liability for Peltola’s Senate campaign.
Congressional hopeful Mary Peltola, seen in Juneau, Alaska, in May, has pushed back on Kamala Harris’s endorsement of her campaign to become Alaska’s first Democratic senator in 12 years.
Nick Puglia, a spokesperson for the National Republican Senatorial Committee, argued that Peltola had worked ‘hand in hand with Kamala Harris to put Alaska last,’ adding that Harris’s support therefore came as no surprise.
Puglia was referring to Peltola’s prior stint in Congress, as US Representative for Alaska-at-large between 2022 and 2025, when Joe Biden was president and Harris was his deputy.
Rebecca Himschoot, an Alaska state lawmaker elected as an Independent, branded Harris’s endorsement of Peltola ‘really dumb.’
She told The Times: ‘She’s riding Mary Peltola’s coattails.
‘And she’s not even running for anything that anyone knows of yet, and didn’t do well here to begin with.’
Harris is said to have privately hinted that she will run for president again in 2028, although few Democrats welcome the prospect of a repeat of a campaign that handed Donald Trump his second White House term.
Harris, pictured in October 2025, is now seen as toxic by Democrats running in competitive races. She failed in her bid to become president in 2024 but has privately hinted that she’s considering running again in 2028.
Peltola did not endorse Harris’s presidential campaign and has positioned herself as a centrist Democrat, who is campaigning on a platform of ‘fish, family and freedom.’
Polls show that Peltola stands a strong chance of becoming Alaska’s first Democrat senator since 2014.
Sixteen candidates – seven Republican, three Democrats, three Independents, a Libertarian, a Green and a member of the Alaska party – will all compete in the same primary as part of state election rules.
The four candidates who win the most seats will then advance to a general election.
Ten of the 11 polls forecasting the result have Peltola as a winner, with a New York Times/Siena poll predicting Republican incumbent Dan S. Sullivan will hold onto his seat.
Confusingly, another Republican called Daniel J. Sullivan is running as a Republican for the same seat.
Dan S. Sullivan, pictured in Washington DC in 2024, is the incumbent senator who Peltola hopes to unseat. President Trump’s unpopular war in Iran could help her do so
That has sparked fears among the GOP that flummoxed voters will mix the two men up, and limit Dan S’s chance of holding onto his seat.
Alaska leans conservative but its voters have an independent streak.
Republican Lisa Murkowski, the state’s other US Senator, backed Peltola in her previous bids for the House of Representatives, despite the two women belonging to rival parties.
Murkowski has backed Dan S. Sullivan for this year’s senate race.
President Trump’s increasingly unpopular war in Iran is seen as a gift to Peltola’s campaign and could ultimately help her flip the seat.
The Daily Mail has contacted Harris for comment on Peltola’s rejection of her endorsement.
