A version of this was originally published in The Daily Brief, our Maine politics newsletter. Sign up here for daily news and insight from politics editor Michael Shepherd.
The Maine Republican Party’s state convention concludes on Saturday at the Augusta Civic Center, with former Gov. Paul LePage and the party’s congressional candidates giving speeches.
Here are two things we will be watching on the final day.
Make no mistake, this is the LePage show.
During a brief walk-through before the convention began on Friday, a kid was walking around offering LePage 2022 stickers an hour and half before things kicked off. You cannot look around much without seeing a sign for LePage’s race against Gov. Janet Mills, a Democrat.
The convention can mostly be read as a big show of unity for LePage. That is no shocker at a party gathering in an election year, but it is notable given the arch-conservative governor’s broken relationships during his eight-year tenure with Sen. Susan Collins and some lawmakers in his own party. Those relationships are largely mended this time around, with Collins whipping support for LePage during her red-meat convention speech on Friday.
The grassroots loves LePage, but he has work to do outside friendly confines. Polling released Thursday by Morning Consult showed Mills at 53 percent approval. That was down four percentage points from the second half of last year, but it is higher than any mark LePage sniffed in office. He is exiting the home-crowd phase of this campaign.
The Friday platform debate in Augusta gave Democrats some ammunition, when the grassroots crowd adopted a document calling for sweeping limits on discussing sex and LGBTQ issues in schools and that continues to define marriage as between a man and a woman. Democrats are holding their convention on May 13 and 14 in Bangor.
An underdog gets a shot at the likely nominee in the swing 2nd District.
Maine’s swing congressional district should again be the site of one of the nation’s biggest races, with Republicans putting Rep. Jared Golden atop of their target list. Former Rep. Bruce Poliquin is the odds-on favorite to get to the general, but Caratunk Selectman Liz Caruso made the June primary ballot despite raising little money and running a low-key campaign.
Her 9:35 a.m. convention speaking slot just ahead of Poliquin on Saturday morning is a big opportunity. She has proposed a slate of debates with Poliquin, a request he has ignored to date. But the state party flagged Poliquin’s lack of grassroots enthusiasm as a contributing factor in his 2018 loss to Golden. While there is little reason to consider Caruso a threat, she can make waves here.