When Mary Peltola was elected to fill Alaska's sole House seat following the death of long-time Representative Don Young, a fair number of Alaskans were concerned that she would, in effect, "go native" once ensconced in Washington. Now, in what appears to be confirmation of that worry, Peltola is holding a campaign fundraiser in Juneau, and one of her guests is none other than California's own poster child for Chinese honey traps, Eric Swalwell.

Rep. Eric Swalwell, a strong opponent of the Alaska energy economic sector, will be a featured guest at a fundraiser for Rep. Mary Peltola in Juneau this week.

Swalwell will be joined by other Democrats — Rep. Mike Thompson of California, and Rep. Dan Kildee of Michigan.

Swalwell supported the senatorial bid of Alan Gross in 2020, and wrote that the Democrats could flip the Senate if Alaskans only voted for Gross, who ran against Sen. Dan Sullivan with the endorsement of the Alaska Democratic Party. He wrote a book about his role in the Trump impeachments. And he proudly sponsored H.R. 815, an attempt to repeal the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge oil and gas program and to designate approximately 1,559,538 acres of land within Alaska in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge as a component of the National Wilderness Preservation System, which would violate the “no more” clause of the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act, Section 1326.

Swalwell, who was kicked off the House Intel Committee in large part because of his involvement with a known Chinese spy, seems an odd choice to help Alaska's sole representative in her campaign. Ms. Peltola already has had "image" issues with a botched fishing photo-op, which would seem to lend credence to the concerns of Alaskans regarding her time in office so far.

What's particularly interesting about all this is Swalwell's antipathy towards Alaskan energy development. Given that Peltola has also weighed in on the issue by siding with the Left on energy issues, maybe we should not be surprised, but extraction is kind of a big deal in Alaska politics. Many people in the Native communities that supported Ms. Peltola in 2022 depend on the jobs created by Alaskan oil and natural gas extraction. Representative Swalwell is, we might remember, familiar with at least one sort of gas production, but he has adamantly opposed any effort to expand oil and natural gas development in Alaska.

That alone makes him an odd choice to support any Alaskan politician. His stance on guns is another liability in strongly pro-Second Amendment Alaska; throughout most of the state, gun ownership is pretty high, and toleration for any who would restrict the right to bear arms is pretty low.

Eric Swalwell, honestly, should have been run out of Washington on a rail years ago. Granted that his home district, California's 14th, which is home to Northern Silicon Valley and many leading technology companies, is reliably blue and would probably vote for a stuffed monkey over the famed Cicero if the monkey had a "D" behind its name. Swalwell's seat is safe, so he can indulge in all the leftist fantasizing he likes and be assured of re-election.

Mary Peltola cannot rest quite so easily on her laurels. As we noted a while ago, Republican Nick Begich III plans to challenge Peltola for Alaska's House seat again in the 2024 election. And now, with this ill-advised move, Peltola has just handed Begich a great campaign line. Mr. Begich would do well to mark the (apocryphal) words of Napoleon Bonaparte: "Never interfere with an enemy while she’s in the process of destroying herself."

Editor's Note: An earlier version of this article incorrectly identified Eric Swalwell's district as the 15th. We apologize to our readers for the error.