The Trump administration decision to promote Sen. Dan Sulllivan by announcing $150 million for an alleged new electric intertie in Alaska comes from the same brain trust promising $5,000 checks to every adult and claiming that South Korea has agreed to put $54 billion into the gas pipeline.

Sen. Dan Sullivan and Energy Secretary Chris Wright spoke with the Alaska Energy Authority in August and received matching AEA vests from the state agency. They claimed they were lowering energy costs for Alaskans.

There is good reason to question whether the $150 million is another in a series of election stunts for Sullivan’s campaign that will never get beyond the press release stage.

The Trump administration is pulling whatever levers it can to dredge up votes for Sullivan, making claims that may or may not be real about federal handouts. Not to mention South Korean largesse.

Here is the Department of Energy press release hyped by Vice President J.D. Vance during his airport stop in Fairbanks.

The Trump administration claims a “preliminary planning estimate of approximately $418 million” for the full 223-mile project.

Vance claimed the project will lower costs for 75 percent of Alaskans. A “preliminary planning estimate” means that $418 million can be filed under fantasy. It does not merit the ranking of educated guess.

In 2024, the Alaska Energy Authority guessed that the second intertie it favored came with a preliminary cost of $730 million. The real cost is going to be higher.

“This project involves building a 250-mile high-voltage direct current (HVDC) overhead transmission line from Beluga (west of Cook Inlet) to Healy,” AEA told legislators and others two years ago.

Perhaps the new federal plan is not for high-voltage direct current, which is more costly to construct, but that raises the question of whether the preferred alternative from two years ago has been abandoned for political reasons?

A $150 million federal grant sounds great when the total cost is $418 million. But it’s less impressive when the real cost is much higher.

We don’t know how much higher.

The Alaska congressional delegation press release about the $150 million grant failed to mention the full cost of the project. That was not a mistake. It was deception.

Sullivan, Sen. Lisa Murkowski, Rep. Nick Begich the Third, Curtis Thayer and the leaders of GVEA and MEA must have concluded it would be best not to puncture the campaign balloon and provide an updated guess.

The 2024 AEA guess proposed getting $365 million in federal funds a match from the state and other sources of $365 million, both of which are tall orders.

The Alaska Energy Authority guessed in 2024 that a 240-mile power line from the Beluga to Healy along the right of way of tThis he proposed Alaska gas pipeline would cost $730 million. On Monday, the Trump administration guessed the cost at $418 million.

The Trump administration says the $150 million from the feds would mean getting the rest of the money, $268 million, from other sources, meaning the state and the utilities.

A project like this makes sense in the long run, but an election year stunt for Sullivan based on questionable numbers does not.

The existing intertie is getting almost no use at the moment because of the lack of relatively inexpensive gas-fired power in Southcentral.

$150 million grant seems like another Trump sham to boost Sullivan