In the final Alaska Senate debate this week, Sen. Mark Begich suddenly found himself defending against two opponents: Republican Dan Sullivan and the memory of former Sen. Ted Stevens.
Stevens, a Republican who served Alaska in the Senate for 40 years, left Washington six years ago under a cloud. As he was being investigated by federal authorities for corruption, Stevens lost re-election to Begich. A few weeks later, Stevens was convicted of accepting and concealing $250,000 in gifts.
But the conviction was thrown out in 2009, after Attorney General Eric Holder found that prosecutors had withheld crucial information. Redemption was bittersweet for Stevens, who had nevertheless lost seat in the Senate, and it was short. In 2010, Stevens was killed when his small plane went down over rural Alaska.
Today, Stevens’ name is memorialized across Alaska, including the Ted Stevens Anchorage International Airport, in no small part because he brought millions of federal dollars in earmarks back to the state. And, this week, his name emerged on that most familiar stage: the Senate race.
“Do you regret the ads you ran against Sen. Stevens in 2008 and have you apologized to his family?” Sullivan asked Begich in this week’s debate.
“I don’t know if you saw that campaign, but I ran ads about what I want to do in Alaska,” Begich responded. “I didn’t run attack ads.”
A television ad by Begich’s 2008 campaign, unearthed this week by Alaska politics writer Amanda Coyne, suggests the opposite.
The ad featured Alaskans expressing concerns over Stevens’ indictment and suggesting he was, indeed, corrupt.
“There’s still too many unanswered questions,” one man said in the ad.
Stevens “has let us all down, and it’s time to move on,” another man said.
The ad was paid for by Begich’s campaign and ran on TV in October 2008. The strategy paid off: Begich, then the mayor of Anchorage, beat Stevens by fewer than 4,000 votes.
After his conviction was thrown out, Stevens, named “Alaskan of the Century” in 2000 by the state legislature, reflected on how the investigation might have changed the election outcome.
“It is unfortunate that an election was affected by proceedings now recognized as unfair,” Stevens said.
This time, the opposite might be true. Republicans hope some voters who supported Begich over Stevens will feel compelled to reverse their choice.
“Now there’s some buyer’s remorse,” said one Republican operative with ties to Alaska. “A lot of people thought the federal government screwed Ted Stevens.”
Last month, Stevens’ daughter, Lily Stevens Becker, wrote an op-ed in the Alaska Dispatch News, urging Alaskans to “honor the legacy of leadership left by my father, your Uncle Ted” by electing Sullivan.
“I have spent a lot of time reflecting on the accomplishments of my father,” Becker wrote. “When I am home in Alaska, I see his presence everywhere. I hope during this election season, Alaskans will take a close look at who has the strongest leadership qualities and soundest vision for the state.”
But Sullivan has likewise had to defend himself against Stevens’ ghost.
Stevens often supported development over the concerns of environmentalists, but he nevertheless opposed the idea of building the Pebble Mine in Bristol Bay, a major salmon fishery. Begich also has opposed the project.
Sullivan has refused to take a position, citing the fact that the project has not been proposed — and Begich has been harshly critical of him for it.
“If [the mine] ever did go through permitting, they’d have a very high hurdle to meet,” Sullivan explained to the Washington Examiner recently. “But that doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be allowed to try and make the case.”
Many Alaskans, when asked, can offer up a memory of Stevens, and Sullivan is no exception. Sullivan’s wife, Julie, was working for Stevens in Washington, D.C., when she first met Sullivan, then a law school student. Julie babysat for Lily Stevens Becker when she was a child, and the families remain close to this day. Sullivan was a pallbearer at Stevens’ funeral.
At a recent Sullivan campaign stop at a senior living facility in Anchorage, a supporter named Lou Palmer was eager to share his own Stevens connection. Palmer met Stevens when he hired Stevens as his attorney, way back before Alaska voters sent Stevens to Congress.
“You could find him at the Double Musky Inn every night,” Palmer said, laughing, invoking the classic, divey restaurant 30 minutes from Anchorage in the ski resort town of Girdwood, where Stevens lived.
A few feet away, Sullivan’s wife traded her own fond memories of Stevens with a supporter.
“He was the best boss,” Julie told the supporter.
Six years removed from the tumultuous end to Stevens’ Senate career, his posthumous reputation in Alaska is as rosy as ever. His political heft, undiminished.
So much so, that his former opponent, Begich, heaped praise on Stevens in the final debate, calling him “a man who did incredible things for our state.”
“When I decided to run for office against Ted Stevens, I called him, and we had a conversation about that,” Begich said. “He said, ‘Good luck on the campaign trail.’”