You’ve got to know when to hold ‘em
Know when to fold ‘em
Know when to walk away
And know when to run
– The Gambler
One of the earliest country songs that I ever recall liking was “The Gambler” by Kenny Rogers; in some ways, the lyrics struck me as a cautionary tale on how to live. We all encounter situations in life where knowing when to step away is a valuable life lesson.
Several days after the allegations of sexual assault allegations were made against Graham Platner, the now-former Senate candidate has just done that—and I have thoughts—and these won’t be the last thoughts, I’m sure, on the aftermath of Platner or the next step of the midterm political fight.
In a recorded video released on multiple platforms, Platner has officially suspended his bid for the U.S. Senate and states that he will be officially withdrawing from the race, officially ending what has been a very tense few days in Maine and in the greater political world. This essentially closes the chapter on what has been a distinctive and almost incomparable political race (my history knowledge isn’t sufficient to assert that its like has never been seen before, but it’s possible) and resets a budding high-energy matchup that was brewing in a generally quiet and forgotten-about state for most people.
Maine, with a population of barely 1.5 million people—92% of whom are white—and tucked away in the corner of New England, is not a state that usually draws much attention beyond Stephen King, lobsters and lighthouses. When I moved here from my home state of Illinois in the early 2000s, it was not uncommon for people back home to ask me: “Where the hell is Maine?” It makes sense; had I not married a guy whose family roots went back to the early founding of Maine, I probably would ask the same question.
However, since Trumpism became a thing a decade ago and even more so in more recent years, increasingly more people have become aware of Maine due to the oversized amount of power held by our senior senator and Trump crony, Susan Collins. Collins has played a consistent role in supporting the rise of Trump authoritarianism and it has been her votes that have almost consistently helped to wreak havoc on the American people lately, especially in the form of right-wing Supreme Court and Cabinet confirmations and the side effects of that, like the overturning of Roe v Wade and the gutting of the Voting Rights Act.
As such, more people outside of the state have become vested in Maine politics and happenings and more pointedly in this year’s Senate race, as more people inside Maine realize that Collins no longer represents current-day Maine and is increasingly and wildly out of touch with many if not most of her constituents. The Maine she was originally elected to represent almost 30 years ago no longer exists, and people are ready for someone who is tuned into what Mainers are currently facing—a bleak situation where the average Mainer is working multiple jobs and still not making ends meet. Where the once-cheap housing has been gobbled up by private equity and the wealthy seeking their second or third homes and where healthcare is increasingly hard to access—literally, as rural hospitals and birthing centers close up and advanced care often requires a trip out of state. The average Mainer has trouble even getting to a dentist because few are accessible, and the ones that you can access often demand cash in hand from you up front.
Truthfully, this was all the case during her last race in 2020 and much of it even before that, but Collins over the years has proven hard to eject from office. No doubt owing to the fact that Maine is a unique state where the Northern half trends more conservative and more blue-collar and generally wary of change while the Southern part of the state—particularly our two southernmost counties—are more diverse, monied, educated and often seen as not being “real” Maine or even disparagingly called part of Massachusetts.
The makeup of the state has meant that despite weariness of many people in Maine toward Collins even before the second Trump term, finding someone who could successfully oust her has proven difficult to do. This is especially true given Mainers’ overall reluctance to embrace change or people who are “From Away” (i.e. not born here), which can limit candidates and their viability.
The last person to run against her, Sara Gideon—despite having served in the Maine legislature (including rising to become the Speaker of the Maine House) and being well-funded—was still solidly defeated by Collins. Admittedly, a lot of people didn’t find Gideon inspiring but she was known in state politics and theoretically should have been a shoe-in—instead murmurings and complaints arose over her being From Away and thus not a “real” Mainer. So, most voters decided to stick with what they knew.
With all this in mind, the rise of political newcomer Graham Platner should, I hope, make a lot more sense to people, especially those armchair political “experts” ridiculing, mocking or lecturing us Democratic voters in Maine right now.
Platner became the early frontrunner and eventually won 72% of the votes in the June primary because, despite the fact that he had no direct political experience, he connected with Mainers of all stripes. It is why despite the controversies that started early in his campaign, many chose to still support him regardless of his brief time with Constellis (formerly notorious private military contractor Blackwater) after he left military service, the tattoo so many framed as being evidence of Nazism, old Reddit posts that were considered by some to be racist or misogynist, extramarital affair issues, admitted issues with alcohol in the past and PTSD, and other lingering questions.
Because he gave people hope.
He named the oligarchy as one of the people’s main enemies. He spoke to the needs for more accessible healthcare and so many other hot-button social issues that impact so many people struggling right now.
He also seemed to have the uncanny knack to connect across Maine, having traversed the state over 60 times to meet people at open houses and public events. Many voters said that it was his in-person events that led them to support him even knowing he had issues.
Though to be clear, there were people who even early on felt that he wasn’t what he claimed to be and felt that he was a walking red flag. Many of them were extraordinarily vocal on social media platforms and they wondered what else might be in his background that he wasn’t telling us. But for the average Mainer, many felt that his background and his progressive views might position him to be the fighter the state needed in the Senate—the first person in a long while who seemed to actually make Susan Collins nervous.
In the end though, there were indeed other things in his past and more serious allegations hitting the news even as he was ramping up for the midterms, and it is those things that led to his bid for the Senate ending despite overwhelmingly winning in the primary in one of the largest turnouts ever.
There are many outside of Maine with far larger platforms than mine issuing recriminations and literally shaming Maine voters for taking a chance on a messy and complicated person in order to dislodge a horrid right-wing tool. As I have done for months now, I am writing as objectively as possible as both a Maine voter and longtime Maine-based writer.
Since the news of the sexual assault allegations broke, people here have been struggling but in many ways the struggle isn’t about Platner himself; it’s about the hope they held and the feeling that once again, the Maine Democratic Party won’t hear them.
Just hours before I sat down late Wednesday night and the wee hours of Thursday to write this piece, it was announced that the Maine Democratic Party—which finds itself in uncharted territory (as we have never had a candidate withdraw after winning the primary)—are planning a 600-person convention which will ultimately pick the new nominee. By law, this will happen by July 27. There are already a number of candidates who have expressed interest, including not just Platner’s former opponents in the senate primary but also several of the people who ran in the recent Democratic primary for governor.
After several days of wondering what Platner was going to do, now the focus shifts to the race to find his replacement, and many in Maine are grappling with what comes next. While national pundits and content creators are eager to tell Mainers what to do next, the feeling locally is a lot less certain—no doubt owing to the feeling that our governor Janet Mills—who while seen outside of Maine as a dynamic champion due to that one time she told Trump she would see him in court—is not viewed by many in Maine as a champion of anything progressive. In fact, the red part of Maine and ever-increasing parts of blue Maine are probably equally united in their deep disdain for Mills at this point. This was reflected in how poorly she fared in the Senate primary against Platner despite being a sitting governor, and her track record and presence reminds many that the Maine Democratic Party might not replace Platner with someone as progressively dedicated as Platner was.
I have spent the last several days talking with local elected officials and voters, and there is a common thread of “What the hell is going on right now?” and “WTF.” While many names are being tossed around on social media, even in me talking off the record to people with direct party ties, no one felt comfortable saying who might end up being the candidate. It seems that for every name issued there are pros and cons on how they might actually build a coalition that will break the Collins lock on that Senate seat.
For the voters that I spoke with, there are a multitude of feelings ranging from resignation that nothing will change and the party will disregard their desire to see a progressive politician—instead choosing a “safe” (and more likely to lose) moderate candidate—to others who are just tired of the Democratic Party itself and feeling that this moment is too similar to the situation Kamala Harris found herself in (and a lot of these people are considering unenrolling from the party all together, for its failure to do more).
As someone who covered the Senate race early on and stayed with it, it has been an exhausting few days (coming on the heels of an exhausting few months). Unlike many national pundits and content creators, I am literally a local Maine independent writer who got my start over 20 years ago for a local paper. I am not sponsored by any entity or campaign. If readers choose not to support my efforts, I don’t get paid.
Because this race has been of importance to me, I jumped into covering it because I wanted to know more as a voter and I wanted to share more info with fellow voters. In the aftermath of the allegations against Platner, I have been called a coon, told that I am not credible and a host of other insults—including allegations that I was paid by the Platner campaign for my coverage of his campaign. While I eventually decided to support Platner like the majority of Democratic voters in Maine, it was based on meeting each candidate and deciding who was viable, as well as being a member of Maine’s Black community and seeing which candidate actually did more than provide lip service online to marginalized communities like mine.
In many ways, what makes this moment even more heartbreaking is seeing BIPOC and other marginalized Mainers feeling duped by Platner (or feeling that he was sabotaged by entities that should have supported him but don’t really want change) and also wondering if anyone else will even bother to see them and invite them to have a say. More so than the overall 72% of voters who supported Platner, I hold that smaller portion who have traditionally felt excluded from the political process in my thoughts. I am already hearing BIPOC Mainers wondering how they will be represented in the 600-person convention, if in any significant way at all.
No matter what, this is not the outcome anyone who is in favor of political and social progress wanted. To watch people nationally treat Mainers as if we are one monolithic clusterfuck of idiots is infuriating. Mainers are more than the story of the moment. We are people in a sparsely populated state that really at times feels like one gigantic town and it is easy to be a Monday-morning quarterback when you are only working with the “facts” from media stories that are often not giving you a full set of facts (often on purpose).
As I said before, I am writing this late into the night. This is not my usual time to write and I hope it’s all coherent, but knowing that people have been waiting for me to say something, I offer these as my initial thoughts. No doubt I will have more to say soon. But right now as a Mainer, I am also wondering “WTF?!” and strapping up for a rocky few weeks at least.
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Image by Sonu Agvan and obtained via Unsplash
