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(WASHINGTON) — Alaska Sen. Ted Stevens has been convicted of lying about free home renovations and other gifts he received from a wealthy oil contractor.
The Senate’s longest-serving Republican, Stevens was found guilty on all seven counts of making false statements on Senate financial documents.
The verdict throws the upcoming election into disarray. Stevens is fighting off a challenge from Democrat Mark Begich and must now either drop out or continue campaigning as a convicted felon.
The election being thrown into “disarray” is a polite way to put it. Obviously, we’ll want to get Ivan Moore or Rasmussen out into the field ASAP. But it’s hard to imagine Stevens having more than a snowball’s chance in hell of hanging onto his seat. In some ways, the 12 jurors in Washington may have been the first voters of the 2008 election.