The Maine Democratic Party has come to the end of the line. Despite spending 15 times more than his opponent, Ben Chin lost the Lewiston mayoral race. Fifteen times the money. Eighty-eight thousand dollars on a mayoral race. Plus, the Chin campaign had an army of dedicated volunteers who made phone calls and knocked on doors. And they still lost.
There was a house cleaning at the Maine Democratic Party after the 2010 debacle, and Democratic forces got a lot of money from Rep. Chellie Pingree and Donald Sussman. They poured money into organizations such as Emerge Maine, EqualityMaine and the Maine Conservation Voters Fund, consolidating their influence beyond the boundaries of the Maine Democratic Party. In the 2012 cycle, individuals affiliated with Paloma Partners — a Sussman company — gave more than $860,000 nationally. Maine Democrats were thrilled. “Now we have our Wall Street money to combat the fat cat Republicans,” many undoubtedly thought. They raised 56.5 percent of all donations that cycle, and Democrats took back the House and Senate with Wall Street-funded candidates, who rode President Barack Obama’s coattails to victory.
Democrats won the House and Senate, and the Pingree clique cemented its hold on Maine Democratic politics while also controlling the state’s largest daily newspaper chain.
That year, Maine Democrats donated to Angus King instead of their own candidate for U.S. Senate, Cynthia Dill. Dill didn’t even get the support of the national Democratic campaign committees. She didn’t see much Pingree support either, and she lost.
Two years later, individuals affiliated with Paloma gave nearly $400,000 nationally while individuals affiliated with Trust Asset Management, another Sussman company, poured a whopping $2.4 million into national Democratic politics. Pingree’s endorsed candidates were Shenna Bellows, Emily Cain and Mike Michaud, who gave up his House seat representing Maine’s 2nd District. The League of Conservation Voters acted as a proxy army and pumped money into ads that would defeat Troy Jackson in the 2nd District Democratic primary against Cain.
That fall, with all that money and organization dedicated to getting out the vote, Democrats still lost.
The Maine Democratic Party was supposed to be good at getting out the vote. But what Maine Democrats have actually shown is that if Obama isn’t running, Maine Democrats can’t win.
An infusion of money controlled by one family has resulted in their players and their issues becoming paramount. The Maine Democratic Party has devolved into a clique.
In 2010, I served on a committee that developed an outreach plan aimed at enlarging and diversifying the Maine Democratic Party, but the party refused to accept it. With new people come new ideas. They bring a progressive, coherent, relevant message, and that is what makes any party successful. But that’s not what the Maine Democratic Party has. Maybe that’s why we lose.
Where do we go from here?
Events are erupting that will spell the doom of the Maine Democratic Party. Our governor has drilled into a vein of xenophobia and racism that runs strong and deep in some parts of Maine. Donald Trump and his supporters have tapped into that nationally, and we are faced with a rise of hate no one could have predicted.
What’s the party to do? Play into that and out-hate Trump and LePage? Stay silent and complacent and hope this goes away? Fight racism and xenophobia and lose elections dominated by racists? Our options under this Wall Street-dominated Maine Democratic Party regime are limited. We are reaping the disastrous consequences of an ingrown, clueless approach. We keep losing.
It’s obvious the Maine Democratic Party doesn’t know how to win. We can’t win without big money, the thinking goes. But tell that to newly re-elected Lewiston Mayor Robert Macdonald, who just cleaned our clock spending little or no money. His message of implied racism and xenophobia was enough.
It’s time to wrest back control of the Democratic Party. It’s time to tell the corporate Democrats they don’t speak for us.
Yes, we can.
Hugh Magbie has served as chair of the Knox County Democrats, on the Maine Democratic Party State Committee and as a volunteer for Organizing for America. He has lived in Warren for 34 years working in education, human resources consulting and as an entrepreneur.