Increasingly isolated from the Democratic Party, Graham Platner is holed up at his home in rural Maine, navigating the likely end of his once-surging campaign for the U.S. Senate, as establishment fury over his prolonged exit grows louder.
Platner’s campaign team held a call Wednesday afternoon in which campaign leadership sounded resigned to the idea that the Democrat’s bid could be ending soon, said a Democrat close to Platner. Campaign staff were told that Platner would speak about the future of his run Wednesday night.
He could drop out of the race as early as Wednesday, probably by prerecorded video, said a second person close to Platner’s team who, like others in this article, spoke on the condition of anonymity to avoid alienating fellow Democrats in what has become an increasingly tense situation.
One of Platner’s key advisers, Morris Katz, flew up to Maine from New York on Tuesday to discuss his withdrawal, said the person. But Platner, whose political support has evaporated since he was
accused of sexual assault on Monday, has struggled with the decision, people close to him said, and has said he would like input on the replacement process, leaving the timing of any announcement unclear.
“It is him who is wanting to hold on,” the first Democrat said. “He is having to come to terms that his dream is dead. The show is over, this is done.”
Until Platner pulls the plug, however, the Democratic Party is at an impasse, unable to fully refocus on its uphill battle to defeat five-term Republican Sen. Susan Collins. The race is critical to Democrats’ longshot bid to retake the Senate, where the party must flip four seats held by Republicans to win back control in November.
That frustration is now spilling into the public.
On Tuesday night, the Maine Democratic Party
released a confrontational video reiterating its call for Platner to drop out so it could select a replacement candidate. If Platner withdraws by Monday, the party has until July 27 to submit a new nominee — though it remains unclear how that decision would be made.
“Unfortunately, Graham Platner’s team has repeatedly reached out to us in an attempt to put their thumb on the scale of what this process looks like,” Devon Murphy-Anderson, executive director of the Maine Democratic Party, said in the video. “We have repeatedly reiterated to Graham Platner’s team that they have no role in determining our next Democratic nominee for the U.S. Senate.”
That posture incensed Platner’s more dedicated supporters, some of whom have felt aggrieved by how quickly Democrats turned on him after the sexual assault accusation and who argue that any replacement candidate must be aligned with the populist politics that fueled his rise.
Party officials are sensitive to the fact that, despite Platner’s downfall, they need to keep the political movement that emerged around him intact in order to win.
“It is important that someone carry forward the movement that has been built here of everyday working-class people who are fed up with a system in Washington that is so broken,” Maine House Speaker Ryan Fecteau said in an interview. “There are a number of people in Maine politics who share the same views as Graham Platner, who have the same message as Graham Platner, who can carry this work forward.”
A spokesperson for Platner denied that “the campaign tried to ‘put its finger on the scale’” of the replacement process. But Platner is seeking to influence it as he navigates his exit — and his decision not to drop out immediately has divided many within his campaign.
Platner’s attempt to continue a campaign detonated by his own alleged behavior has not only exasperated some Maine Democrats but also dumbfounded them.
“People who have made their political careers decrying a rigged political system are now trying to rig the political system,” quipped a Democratic operative who works in Maine.
National Democrats, led by the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, have said that they will not spend money in Maine if Platner remains the nominee.
But their role in selecting his successor is minimal, beyond supporting the Maine Democratic Party’s currently unknown plans for selecting a replacement should Platner drop out. There is belief within the committee that any nominee, at this point, will be stronger than a scandal-plagued Platner, said one person familiar with the committee’s thinking.
Since he launched his campaign last summer, Platner’s political rise and his outsider message have invigorated Maine Democrats, who have long failed to find a candidate who can defeat Collins, despite the state’s Democratic lean.
Many voters were willing to overlook earlier controversies that plagued the charismatic 41-year-old oyster farmer and military veteran, including old social media posts where Platner downplayed sexual assault and made other inflammatory comments; a tattoo resembling a Nazi symbol that he had covered up; sexually explicit text messages sent to other women after he married; and accusations of violent behavior by ex-girlfriends.
Then on Monday, a woman who used to date Platner said he entered her home intoxicated one night in late 2021 and forced himself on her as she told him to stop.
On Tuesday, a second ex-girlfriend
told The Washington Post that Platner repeatedly removed protection without her consent when they were having sex. The campaign called the claim “categorically false and politically motivated.”
Unlike some politicians engulfed by scandal, Platner retains a core of close advisers who have stuck by him since Monday, allowing him to hold out against calls for his withdrawal.
In April, when then-Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-California) was accused of sexual assault by a former staffer amid a run for governor, top campaign staff immediately quit and his campaign imploded within days. Platner, by contrast, continues to operate with the inner circle of his campaign from his home in the small coastal town of Sullivan.
The scene was quiet there Wednesday morning. Several cars were parked in Platner’s driveway near a pile of chopped wood and a boat covered in a green tarp. A few reporters were across the narrow road.
As the public awaits word from Platner about his plans, longtime friends say this has been a difficult moment, with one even suggesting that Platner could continue to fight.
“Everybody says they are pulling their support. Is that truly what they are going to do? Are they just going to let Susan Collins win?” the friend said. “That seems highly unlikely to me because we need Maine to flip the Senate.”
That is not a universal view, however. Some people who have backed Platner for months, even through his many scandals, are too disgusted with him to continue their relationship.
“At this point, he knows I know he’s lied to me directly too many times,” said a top Maine Democrat who has been close to Platner. “I don’t think he has the shame to speak directly to me.”
Joanna Slater in Sullivan, Maine, contributed to this report.
