The phrase "almost as controversial" is correct and usable in written English.
It can be used when comparing the level of controversy of two different subjects or topics, indicating that one is nearly as contentious as the other.
Example: "The new policy is almost as controversial as the previous one, sparking heated debates among the community."
Alternatives: "nearly as contentious" or "almost equally divisive".
This version proved almost as controversial as the original.
One was London's Crossrail, a project that was then forecast to cost some £15bn and was almost as controversial as HS2.
Converting the bank deposits into bonds would be a highly unpopular step, almost as controversial as the decree that set off the crisis in December 2001 by freezing an estimated $60 billion in bank deposits.
Following the June release of her second major-label album, Pageant Material, Musgraves finds herself straddling several metrics of success – a rare position for a heartland country star, and one that's become almost as controversial as her earlier lyrics.
Simon Watts brings together archive accounts of the dancer whose private life was almost as controversial as her dancing.
Indeed, among neuroscientists, the new "comprehensive atlas" of the cerebral cortex is almost as controversial as a historical atlas of the Middle East.
It turns out Obama had a far more ambitious plan -- a high-tech geoengineering program that will almost certainly prove to be as controversial as it is (or was) secret.
And when he is perpetrating the unflinchingly filmed acts of violence that have already made this movie somewhat controversial, he seems almost as vulnerable as his victims.
The OBR's new costings show that by 2021 the changes to universal credit will save the Treasury almost as much each year as the controversial tax credits policy would have done.
They were as controversial as Manet; critics got almost as angry at Rossetti as they did at Manet's Olympia.
Squeezing the wealthy buys some short-term deficit reduction: over the next decade, President Obama's plan could trim (almost) as much off the deficit as Paul Ryan's controversial Republican budget — $4 trillion, give or take.
