We’re examining some of the claims made in the campaign ads of Alaska's U.S. House candidate. Alaska Public Media Washington correspondent Liz Ruskin joined Alaska News Nightly host Casey Grove to talk about a claim challenger Nick Begich III has made about incumbent Congresswoman Mary Peltola’s voting record.
Listen:
This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity.
Casey Grove: Liz, remind us what the ad claim is.
Liz Ruskin: There are several versions of the ads saying Mary Peltola votes with Democrats. More specifically, the Begich campaign has an ad claiming: “Today, Mary Peltola votes with Biden Harris over 80% of the time.”
CG: So, first of all, is that true?
LR: Well, sort of. The reason it's hard to say is that, of course, President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris don’t have votes in the U.S. House. There are different ways to analyze whether a member votes for the president’s position. When I asked for the source of that 80% figure, the Begich campaign sent an analysis from 538/ABC News. It indeed does show that Peltola voted with the Biden position just over 80% of the time. It is based on votes last year where the Biden administration expressed a position. That’s 53 votes.
CG: Is 53 a lot?
LR: No, it’s 53 votes out of the 723 the House took last year. But the other thing that’s odd is that the ad says “today” Mary Peltola votes with Biden over 80% of the time. The analysis is based on last year. And Peltola, like a handful of Democrats from districts Donald Trump won in 2020, has been moving to the right, voting with Republicans on a lot of hot-button issues, like the border, and on resolutions condemning the Biden-Harris administration. I look at another tool, called DW Nominate, that plots all House members on a graph, from liberal to conservative, based on their votes. It shows Peltola is one of the LEAST likely Democrats to vote with her party.
CG: What’s the point of the Begich campaign saying she votes with Biden and Harris? I mean she is a Democrat, right?
LR: Right. She’s a Democrat from a state that Trump won by 10 percentage points. If Begich can tie her to the Democrats nationally, they hope to cancel out the image she’s created by breaking with her party to support developments on federal land like Willow, the Conoco-Phillips project in the Arctic, and on all those Republican resolutions and messaging bills.
CG: Liz, you also wrote a story this week on the Peltola campaign’s claim that Begich made money allegedly selling phony medical devices to seniors. What’s the story there?
LR: Yes, and the Democratic Party joined in with a mailer claiming Begich was “scamming seniors with fake medical devices." Long story short, the claim relates to Begich’s dad’s business, EarthPulse Press, which, for a few years, sold devices on its website — like a headset that was supposed to reduce tension and provide biofeedback, and a handheld device to find acupuncture points. Nick Begich III owns a 17% stake in the business and earns $50,000 a year, more or less, from it.T he Peltola campaign claims the devices weren’t good, or that the business made outsized claims. I talked to Nick Begich Sr. and he says these products weren’t “medical devices” and were never marketed to seniors. And anyway, he said his son, the candidate, didn’t have an active role in the business.
