WESTBROOK, Maine — Westbrook residents and local leaders on Wednesday evening gathered to call for a change in the tone of Maine’s politics and support their State House representative, who was the target of a verbal attack and threats from Gov. Paul LePage last week.
Speaking to a group of about 60 people in Riverbank Park, Rep. Drew Gattine repeated his call that LePage resign, a demand that has been taken up by a growing group of state Democrats as the governor’s latest controversy has deepened over the last week, according to a Portland Press Herald video of the event.
“It’s not anything I say out of anger, but we are at the point now where the person who is in the chief executive’s office is not in a position, is not ready and capable and fit to continue to do the job,” said Gattine. “And I certainly, along with everybody, want him to get whatever he’s got to resolve, resolved.”
Last week, after Gattine was critical of racially-charged comments LePage made about Maine’s drug problem, the governor retorted with an obscene voicemail and suggestion that he would like to dual the Democratic legislator.
John and Deborah Rumery, who live down the block from Gattine, said that they also would like to see the governor step down and were repulsed at how the representative was treated.
“It was disgusting, and coming from the so-called governor, just disgusting,” said John Rumery.
At the event, which was billed as a “rally for decency,” several of the local political and religious leaders who spoke emphasized a broader need to return to civility, which they say has left Maine politics. The My Place Teen Center, where LePage had intended to hold an abruptly canceled town hall meeting Wednesday, collected donations at the event.
Westbrook City Council President Brendan Rielly expressed concern over the impression that LePage could be leaving on young Mainers.
“I don’t think anyone in the state thinks that our kids should behave the way the governor is behaving,” said Rielly. “And our kids are watching.”
June Prairie of Westbrook said that LePage’s approach to politics in Maine mirrors what Donald Trump is doing on the national stage, although she noted that LePage was at it first. She said she came to the rally out of broad concern with the course of American politics.
“The reason I came here is that I was thinking about the words civilization and civility,” she said. “I want to support civility because I’m worried about civilization.”