Maine Republicans were criticizing the conservative proponents of a voter ID and absentee voting limit referendum that was roundly rejected in Tuesday’s election.
The displeasure with the tactics that Rep. Laurel Libby, R-Auburn, and her Dinner Table group used in pushing the “Voter ID for ME” initiative was mostly confined before Election Day to private conversations among Republicans who otherwise noted a majority of Mainers in past polling have supported a requirement to show photo identification when casting a ballot.
Tuesday night brought the result some in the GOP were expecting — a resounding loss as more than 60% of Maine voters rejected Question 1. The candid assessments started to trickle in between Tuesday night and Wednesday morning.
Republicans continued to criticize Secretary of State Shenna Bellows, a Democrat, for her wording of Question 1 that led with the absentee voting changes but also critiquing Libby and her allies without naming them. They also grappled with a mirroring share 60% of Maine voters approving Question 2, the initiative to create a “red flag law” that allows families to ask courts to temporarily remove weapons from loved ones deemed dangerous.
“It was a tactical error,” Rep. Reagan Paul, R-Winterport, tweeted about the decision to include absentee voting limits with the voter ID proposal.
Lauren LePage, a GOP strategist and the daughter of former Gov. Paul LePage, was also candid Wednesday morning in a Facebook post that called for “some tough love” and alluded to Libby and Dinner Table co-founder Alex Titcomb’s Question 1 strategy.
“We have to learn to listen to each other, and perhaps settle for less and take the win, than to try to overreach and give the opposition the opportunity to beat us,” LePage wrote.
Libby, who had encouraged supporters to join her in voting early ahead of Tuesday’s election, and Titcomb did not respond to requests for comment, but the “Voter ID for ME” campaign wrote in a Wednesday post on Facebook they intend to keep pushing for Maine to join 36 other states, including neighboring New Hampshire, with similar photo identification laws.
“When next presented with that opportunity, we believe they will pass Voter ID and strengthen our elections,” the group wrote in its post.
Libby also took offense to Question 1 opponents focusing on the absentee voting aspects. Last week, Titcomb dismissed “opinions” from certain skeptics, “especially when they have zero knowledge of the campaigns.”
The array of restrictions included cutting two days of absentee voting, banning prepaid postage on return envelopes, ending phone applications or those on behalf of family members and no longer allowing older Mainers or people with disabilities to automatically receive ballots for each election, among other changes.
In a Wednesday morning radio interview on WVOM, Libby doubled down in blaming Bellows and other opponents for building an opposition campaign based “on the absolute falsehood that Question 1 would do away with absentee voting.”
While some voters in different Maine towns echoed Libby’s argument in Tuesday interviews, others said they clearly understood what was at stake. Darrin Dionne, a 33-year-old voter in Bowdoin, said he supported Question 1 but that the wording for both referendums was “blatantly confusing.”
But DeAnn Lewis, a South Portland retiree, said Question 1 was trying to feed into claims of voter fraud when studies show it is extremely rare.
“I think that’s giving in to the fear mongering,” Lewis said.
Though not immediately clear when and how a revamped voter ID push will happen in Maine, the internal GOP disagreements remain noticeable. Democrats also continued to vastly lead Republicans in absentee voting ahead of Tuesday, making up more than 50% of the requests nearly 145,000 Maine voters made, which was 30,000 more than the 2023 election total.
“The facts are brutal and undeniable: Republicans got crushed, both nationally and right here in Maine,” Falmouth real estate leader David Jones, who is seeking the party’s nomination for governor in 2026, said Wednesday. “This should be a wake-up call for every Republican across the state.”