Alaska Senator Ted Stevens Reveals Secret Plan to Sell Alaska Back To Russia

Alaska Sen. Ted Stevens, indicted on corruption charges, today revealed that he had concluded a deal with undercover FBI agents masquerading as Russian government agents to sell Alaska back to Russia for $11,000.

“It was a temptation too great to ignore,” Stevens told reporters at a hastily assembled Juneau news conference. “Every dime I make from my Senate salary goes right back into my campaign. In Alaska, $11,000 goes a long way.”

The United States originally purchased Alaska from Russia for $7.2 million in 1867. Sen. Stevens had received phone calls from men named “Boris” and “Alexei” claiming to represent the Russian government. The men, who were actually FBI agents, told Sen. Stevens they wanted to buy Alaska back “because of the demands of national sovereignty,” the Senator admitted.

“They sounded like the real deal to me,” Sen. Stevens said. “They didn’t have Russian accents, which should have tipped me off, and whenever they called, I would hear a lot of talk in the background of other FBI agents talking about other undercover cases. That should have tipped me off, too.”

At the behest of “Boris” and “Alexei,” Sen. Stevens snuck a rider selling Alaska back to Russia into the last page of a hotly debated stem cell research bill, which was passed by the Senate and ultimately signed into law by President Bush.

The Senator received his payoff in a pouch disguised as a feedbag for dogs at a checkpoint of the recent Iditarod cross-Alaska dog race. He was only arrested after he went on a spending spree in the Anchorage area, using the marked $100 bills to buy a new snowblower, new shoeshoes, a new muffler, sixteen gallons of kerosene, and a gimme cap that read “I [heart symbol] Alaska.”

Sen. Stevens said he “deeply regretted” his lapse of judgment, and that he especially regretted the fact that since the bill containing his rider had been signed into law, the sale of Alaska to Russia was “irrevocable and it takes effect on September 1. I hope the people of Alaska who placed their trust in me can forgive me. To them, I say, das vedanya and have a nice day.”