A little-known Democratic operative who has worked behind the scenes on multiple political campaigns is now facing scrutiny over allegations of a scheme designed to disrupt Alaska’s Senate race.

The contest is one of the most closely watched races of the midterm election cycle, with Democrat Mary Peltola seeking to unseat Republican incumbent Dan Sullivan.

Questions emerged earlier this year after a second candidate named Dan Sullivan, previously unknown to many voters, appeared on the ballot.

But fewer than seven days before Election Day, an investigation suggested the matching names may have been part of a deliberate effort to confuse voters and help Peltola’s campaign.

A recent investigation identified Jerid Kurtz as the alleged intermediary who recruited prospective candidates, including the “second” Sullivan, to enter the Senate race.

The New York Times’ report triggered calls for a federal investigation from the Trump administration and the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.

After the allegations became public, Kurtz deleted his social media profiles and removed the website of Wingspan Strategies, the firm he co-owns.

According to Case Western Reserve University, Kurtz entered politics after graduating in 2005 with a degree in political science and English.

He earned a law degree from Case Western in 2009 and went on to serve as a board member and vice president of NARAL Pro-Choice Ohio.

Kurtz later became communications director for the Ohio Democratic Party and worked on efforts to re-elect President Barack Obama and Senator Sherrod Brown, according to his alumni profile.

His LegiStorm biography says he served as campaign manager for Raphael Warnock’s 2020 Senate campaign. Kurtz also managed campaigns for David Trone and Anthony Brown.

The New York Times reported that Kurtz was introduced in the summer of 2025 to Elisa Rios, Peltola’s former campaign manager, and Anton McParland, her former chief of staff.

Rios told the newspaper that Kurtz was presented as a “specialist in secret ballot maneuvers.” His reported assignment was to locate and persuade someone named “Dan Sullivan” to run for the Senate.

Early in 2026, Kurtz reportedly told people close to the Peltola campaign that he had found a Dan Sullivan prepared to run in order to “help Mary.”

Kurtz also allegedly approached other potential spoiler candidates. Among them was Matthew Salisbury, whom he contacted through a Google Voice number before meeting him at a pub while using the name “Zane.”

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Text messages reviewed by The Times showed that members of Peltola’s campaign and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee referred to Kurtz as “Jarid,” “Jared” or simply “our friend.”

In response to the allegations, the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform has launched an investigation and has asked Kurtz to testify in person on November 6. 

Chairman James Comer sent Kurtz a letter on Thursday warning that if he did not voluntarily appear for the interview, the committee would be ‘forced to evaluate the use of compulsory process.’ 

Trump has also demanded Peltola be removed from the ballot and investigated. Alaska Governor Mike Dunleavy has ordered an investigation into the campaign. 

‘Deliberately tricking voters into casting their ballots for someone else strikes at the integrity of our elections,’ the governor wrote on X. 

Vice President JD Vance called the results of The Times investigation ‘disgraceful,’ accusing Peltola of ‘trying to steal a Senate seat from the voters of Alaska.’

The Justice Department has already filed a lawsuit to block the certification of the results if Senator Sullivan loses due to the second Sullivan’s presence in the race. 

Sullivan has accused Peltola and her campaign of ‘gaslighting Alaskans, denying a scheme they were running all along.’  

The Peltola campaign and the DSCC have repeatedly denied any involvement in the ‘second’ Sullivan campaign or in recruiting other candidates. 

During a rally on Thursday, Peltola doubled down on the claims, telling voters the New York Times investigation was ‘just another distraction.’

‘This is all stuff to sell newspapers. This is all stuff to get subscriptions,’ she said. ‘Nobody at The New York Times cares about affordability in Alaska.’

Supporters of Peltola’s campaign have argued that if true, the scheme does not violate election laws. 

Chris Redfern, a former member of the US House, who worked with Kurtz when he was the communications director for the Ohio Democratic Party, told the Cincinnati Enquirer that similar schemes are ‘a campaign tactic as old as ballot boxes.’ 

‘It is quite common to find candidates to muddy the waters,’ he added. 

Redfern said Kurtz was ‘exceptional’ and the two ‘enjoyed a great deal of success’ when they worked together. Kurtz was not immediately available for comment.  

An Arizona man allegedly arranged for another man to sexually assault his fiancée at their home, but the mother of two fought back and drove off the attacker in the driveway.

Zarian Dyer, 23, was arrested Thursday after investigators accused him of recruiting 20-year-old Adrian Ayala to assault his fiancée, the Buckeye Police Department said.

Police said Ayala carried out the alleged attack after arriving at the woman’s home in Buckeye, about 30 miles west of Phoenix, at around 6 p.m. on Oct. 16. She was inside with her two children at the time.

According to court records obtained by the Merced Sun-Star, the woman told police she noticed a “random man” poking his head through her front door just minutes after her fiancée left to pick up groceries.

Her 2-month-old son was sleeping in a bedroom, while her 17-month-old daughter stood behind her as she confronted Ayala. He allegedly asked to use the bathroom.

Ayala allegedly kicked open the front door and forced his way into the house. Once inside, he “began to choke her by grabbing her by the neck,” the woman told investigators.

The confrontation moved into the bathroom, where Ayala allegedly locked himself inside with the woman. He “began trying to undo the button on the victim’s pants but was unable to” do so before allegedly groping her, the Merced Sun-Star reported, citing court records.

The woman eventually managed to force her alleged attacker out of the house and into the front yard.

Home security video obtained by AZ Family shows the woman battling Ayala in the driveway. She pushed him away, slapped him in the face and yelled at him as he leaned his weight against her.

As she resisted, Ayala allegedly told her, “Your boyfriend told me you’d be into this,” according to court records.

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The woman pursued Ayala down the street as he ran from the scene before police arrived.

Ayala was arrested the next day at his home in Goodyear, roughly 15 miles away. Investigators then allegedly discovered that the attack had been arranged by the victim’s fiancée, police said.

Ayala told investigators he had met Dyer online and agreed to go to the woman’s home to sexually assault her without her knowledge or consent.

Detectives seized Ayala’s electronic devices and found communications between him and Dyer that allegedly discussed the planned attack.

Dyer faces charges of aggravated assault, sexual abuse, attempted sexual assault, kidnapping and conspiracy.

Ayala was charged with kidnapping, sexual abuse, burglary and aggravated assault, according to court records obtained by the Merced Sun-Star.

He made his first court appearance on Oct. 18.

Ayala’s attorney told the judge that his client had been taken to the home by the woman’s boyfriend for a “role-play scenario.” The attorney argued that Ayala did not intend to commit a felony and believed the woman had consented, the Merced Sun-Star reported.

Court records show Ayala’s trial is scheduled to begin on April 1, 2027.

It was not immediately known when Dyer is scheduled to appear in court.

Investigators said it remains unclear what drove Dyer to allegedly orchestrate the attack on his fiancée.

Ahmed Nur Said Elmi, the former husband of Congresswoman Ilhan Omar and a man alleged by critics to be her brother, described himself as a “gay man” in an academic paper published earlier this year.

The Minnesota Democrat has faced longstanding allegations that she married Elmi, a British citizen, in 2009 to help him secure a green card—claims previously reported by the Daily Mail.

Omar has repeatedly rejected the allegations, calling them a right-wing conspiracy theory. President Donald Trump’s administration has now opened a new investigation into her immigration history.

As the inquiry continues, the Daily Caller obtained an academic report published by Elmi, who is a doctoral researcher at the University of Bristol. The paper, released in August, is titled “Out in the Field: Notes on Researching Queer Violence in Kenya.”

“As a gay man of the East African diaspora, my fieldwork was never neutral,” Elmi wrote in the introduction.

“It was a space shaped by tension, risk, intimacy and vulnerability,” he added.

“While navigating the challenges of ethnographic research, I immersed myself in the lived experiences of the people I spoke with, while also negotiating my own safety and the complexities of my identity.”

The Daily Mail has contacted Omar’s office for comment.

Elmi moved in with Omar and her first husband, Ahmed Hirsi, in Minnesota in 2009.

A friend of Hirsi’s later described Elmi to the New York Post as an “extremely feminine Somali guy” who “was walking around in tight female clothing, which is heavily frowned upon in the Somali community.”

The unidentified source said he once asked Hirsi about Elmi and was told that he was “his wife’s brother from London.”

According to the source, Hirsi said Omar had legally married Elmi “to get him papers,” while he and Omar were married only under Islamic law.

Elmi left Minnesota in 2012, and he and Omar finalized their divorce five years later, in 2017.

The New York Times has reported that FBI and Homeland Security agents investigated the alleged sham marriage in 2016 and found some evidence that appeared to point to fraud.

The case ultimately stalled after prosecutors determined that any potential criminal charges were beyond the five-year statute of limitations.

A separate review of Omar’s immigration history in 2019, during Trump’s first administration, produced a different finding.

Three former immigration officials told The Washington Post that investigators found insufficient evidence of wrongdoing and did not identify problems with her naturalization.

That review examined several of the same allegations now under scrutiny, including questions about her marriage, her age and her father’s immigration records.

Omar has firmly denied wrongdoing and dismissed the longstanding marriage claims as a conspiracy theory.

In an interview last week with MS NOW’s Chris Hayes, she described the allegation that she married her brother as ‘insane’ and said it originated with a blog before being amplified by right-wing conspiracy theorists.

When Hayes asked whether there was any possibility that her former husband was related to her, Omar replied: ‘Not to my knowledge.’

The president quickly pounced on her response during a rally in Iowa on October 22, mocking Omar for saying she didn’t know whether her former husband was related to her.

‘She didn’t know whether or not she married her brother. She wasn’t sure,’ Trump told the crowd, calling it ‘one of the worst answers I think I’ve ever heard.’

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He also demanded that Omar resign from Congress, claiming she had used a fake name to be sworn in.

Trump cited a Justice Department filing that used the name ‘Ilhan Nur Said Elmi’ in reference to Omar.

Investigators are also examining questions surrounding Omar’s family’s arrival in the United States in 1995 and whether her father, Nur Omar Mohamed, misrepresented information on immigration paperwork.

According to The Washington Post, investigators are focusing on whether Omar or her father intentionally misstated her birth date to ensure she qualified for US citizenship through her father when he became a naturalized citizen in 2000.

Authorities are also examining whether her father omitted or misrepresented information about his past military service in Somalia.

Omar was born in Somalia in 1982 and arrived in the United States with her family in 1995, when she was around 12 or 13.

The current inquiry includes questions about whether her age was accurately recorded in immigration documents, an issue that officials reviewing her file in 2019 said they could not conclusively resolve because birth records for refugees from Somalia were often unreliable.

The scrutiny also extends to her marriage history.

Public records show Omar legally married Elmi in February 2009.

The pair separated in 2011, but did not legally divorce until December 2017.   

Elmi had previously sought to move his marriage-based green card from conditional to permanent status.

According to a former immigration official cited by The Washington Post, authorities requested additional evidence because of concerns about the marriage’s validity, but Elmi withdrew the application after that request.

The latest scrutiny comes weeks after federal agents searched Omar’s Washington, DC, home on October 12 as part of a criminal investigation.

Agents seized her phone and passport, and authorities have issued more than a dozen grand jury subpoenas connected to the inquiry, including subpoenas to some of her relatives.

The Justice Department has not announced charges against the congresswoman in connection with the allegations.

Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin has also weighed in on the federal investigation, saying investigators were pursuing the case and indicating that it could be presented to a grand jury.

In an October 16 interview on The Charlie Kirk Show, Mullin said investigators expected to take the case to a grand jury, but his comments did not establish that Omar had committed a crime or that prosecutors had decided to charge her.

Omar, meanwhile, has accused the Trump administration of using the investigation to intimidate her because of her outspoken criticism of the president.

The congresswoman said she believed the search of her home was politically motivated, pointing to Trump’s repeated public attacks against her.

Trump has denied involvement in the search, while administration officials have maintained that law enforcement decisions are based on the facts and the law.

The Justice Department has also sought to keep the application for the search warrant sealed while investigators review the evidence seized from Omar’s home.

Prosecutors said releasing the material at this stage could jeopardize the ongoing investigation and that they had not yet decided whether to bring charges or whom to charge.

The investigation has raised questions about the timing of the search, which took place just weeks before the November 3 midterm elections.

Albania’s opposition lawmakers brought Parliament to a standstill on Thursday after igniting flares that sent clouds of colored smoke through the chamber, intensifying tensions after weeks of student-led protests against the government.

Members of the opposition Democratic Party also prevented lawmakers from reaching the podium during a vote on legislation concerning the central bank, Reuters reported.

“These ruling lawmakers are criminals, and they deserve tear gas, rubber bullets, cracked skulls, and broken bones—not the young people,” opposition leader Sali Berisha said before his microphone was switched off.

As disorder spread across the chamber, opposition lawmakers gathered around Berisha with blue flares—the Democratic Party’s official color—and held up photographs of demonstrators allegedly injured by police rubber bullets.

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Student-led protests have swept Albania in recent weeks, with demonstrators calling for Prime Minister Edi Rama to resign over allegations of corruption, inadequate funding for schools, high unemployment, and limited economic prospects.

The demonstrations began on Oct. 13 and soon escalated into clashes with police, while some protesters set fire to government buildings. In Tirana, demonstrators also confronted riot police guarding the headquarters of Rama’s governing Socialist Party.

The unrest has since expanded beyond the capital, reaching several other cities throughout the country.

Rama, who has led Albania since 2013 and won a fourth term last year, has blamed “foreign hands who do not want Albania in the European Union.” He has also accused outside actors of exploiting the protests, saying they “represent organized crime rather than students.”

In an effort to deter further violence, Rama announced tougher penalties, including fines of up to $6,000 for anyone taking part in a protest that becomes violent—even if that individual does not personally commit a violent act.

Protest organizers have called for another demonstration on Saturday.

Arizona bank employees rushed to the aid of a longtime neighborhood food vendor as a powerful storm swept through the Phoenix area, helping him and his cart reach safety while fierce winds and hail pounded the area. The heartwarming rescue was captured on video.

The incident occurred at a PNC Bank branch as severe weather swept through the Phoenix area last week, prompting employees to help a local vendor caught in the storm, according to FOX 10 Phoenix.

Footage recorded by someone inside the bank shows an employee working with the vendor, identified as Hilario Cruz Cruz, to pull his food cart indoors as the storm intensified.

The rescue video spread rapidly across social media, drawing more than 1 million views on TikTok along with hundreds of thousands of likes.

“With one hand, I held the door against the strong wind blowing it, and with my other hand I pulled the cart inside. The young man was doing the same on his side. If I had been anywhere else, maybe they wouldn’t have been able to help me like that,” Cruz Cruz told FOX 10 Phoenix through a translator.

Cruz Cruz said the bank employees were longtime customers who had purchased food from his cart for years.

He believes their familiarity with him and his business prompted them to intervene when the severe weather arrived.

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“They said, ‘He’s not going anywhere else. He stays here, and we’re bringing the cart inside.’ I said, ‘It won’t fit,’ but the manager said, ‘I know it will,’” he recalled.

Cruz Cruz was soaked by the storm and later faced fallen trees and branches as he made his way home.

A week later, though, Cruz Cruz had returned to Peoria Avenue, where he was once again selling elotes and fresh fruit.

He said sales have surged since the video of the Phoenix storm rescue went viral.

“I deeply appreciate my long-term customers. That’s why they didn’t leave me outside,” Cruz Cruz said. “I am profoundly grateful to the bank manager and employees because, thanks to them, nothing bad happened to me.”

News Media has contacted PNC Bank for additional information.