Daniel Scott Sullivan (born November 13, 1964) is an American politician, attorney, and Marine Corps veteran serving as the junior United States senator from Alaska since 2015.

In August, he won the Republican primary, defeating Alaska Lieutenant Governor Mead Treadwell and 2010 Senate nominee Joe Miller.

He studied economics at Harvard University, graduating in 1987 with a Bachelor of Arts degree magna cum laude.

Sullivan was a member of the Georgetown Law Journal and earned a Juris Doctor degree with cum laude honors.

[4] Sullivan joined the United States Marine Corps in 1993 after completing his law and foreign service degrees.

While serving as Assistant Secretary of State he owned a house in Anchorage and continued to vote in Alaska elections by absentee ballot, while claiming Bethesda, Maryland, as his primary residence for tax purposes.

[14] On October 15, 2013, Sullivan announced his candidacy for the U.S. Senate seat held by Democratic incumbent Mark Begich in the 2014 election.

Stevens had filed for the election in 2009[17] following his exoneration,[18] and was widely expected to win, but died in a plane crash on August 9, 2010.

This tactic had previously been used in the Massachusetts 2012 U.S. Senate race between Elizabeth Warren and Scott Brown to drastically limit outside, third-party spending.

[30] Gross touted his "deep roots" in the state and published several campaign videos that received national attention.

[33] Ultimately, Sullivan defeated Gross 54% to 41%, with Alaskan Independence Party nominee John Howe receiving nearly 5% of the vote.

[39] Sullivan opposed Trump during the 2016 presidential race, releasing a statement that said, "We need national leaders who can lead by example" on issues of sexual assault and violence against women.

[47] In October 2020, the Environmental Investigation Agency recorded and published conversations between undercover actors, who pretended to be potential investors in Pebble Mine in Alaska, and corporate executives.

In the recordings, the executives made clear that they intended to expand the mine substantially beyond their previously stated intentions, and that they believed Sullivan would surreptitiously support this project after the election.

[48][49] An investigation by Popular Information found that besides the $10,000 Sullivan received from Pebble employees and executives, the total rose to $34,000 when contributions from Northern Dynasty were included.

[51] In May 2023, President Biden celebrated the EPA's veto in a Rose Garden meeting with 200 opponents of the project, including many Bristol Bay tribes and nationwide environmental organizations.

[52] Sullivan lobbied the Trump administration to open up the Tongass National Forest in Alaska to logging and other forms of development.

[54] In June 2024, Sullivan added a rider to the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2025 that would have required the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) to grant the Ambler Access Project right-of-way within 30 days of the act's passage, citing national security interests.

[57][58] On June 6, 2021, Sullivan and Senators Tammy Duckworth and Christopher Coons visited Taipei in an U.S. Air Force C-17 Globemaster III transport to meet President Tsai Ing-wen and Minister Joseph Wu during the pandemic outbreak of Taiwan to announce President Joe Biden's donation plan of 750,000 COVID-19 vaccines included in the global COVAX program.

[59][60][61] In the 2014 Senate campaign in Alaska, the NRA Political Victory Fund (NRA-PVF) declined to make an endorsement.

[64][65][66] In 2016, Sullivan defended the Republican refusal to hold a hearing for President Barack Obama's Supreme Court nominee, Merrick Garland, on the basis that the nomination was made "in the midst of an important national election."

"[67][68] In October 2020, in the last few weeks before the 2020 presidential election, Sullivan defended Trump's decision to nominate a Supreme Court justice—saying he was "well within his constitutional authority"—and voted to confirm the nominee, Amy Coney Barrett.

Sullivan has cosponsored the bipartisan STATES Act proposed in the 115th U.S. Congress by Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren and Colorado Senator Cory Gardner that would exempt individuals or corporations in compliance with state cannabis laws from federal enforcement of the Controlled Substances Act.

[75] The veto left new Coast Guard cutters that were scheduled to be homeported in Alaska without port facilities to maintain them.