The BDN Opinion section operates independently and does not set news policies or contribute to reporting or editing articles elsewhere in the newspaper or on bangordailynews.com
Emily Barr is the retired CEO of Graham Media Group and currently serves on the board of The Maine Monitor and is on the boards of the Associated Press and the Carole Kneeland Project for Responsible Journalism. She is also a donor and subscriber to the Bangor Daily News.
A recent Maine Monitor investigation revealed that nearly 100 billionaires and their spouses have donated to Sen. Susan Collins’ re-election campaign. Full disclosure: I serve as board chair of the independent, nonpartisan Maine Center for Public Interest Reporting, which publishes The Maine Monitor.
According to reporter Josh Keefe, billionaire donors contributed $9.8 million in support of Collins, while small-dollar donors contributed $9.6 million in support of challenger Graham Platner.
Keefe also reported that the billionaire donors supporting Collins have a combined net worth of roughly $888 billion — nearly nine times Maine’s entire 2025 economic output. None of them live in Maine.
Think about that for a moment.
The people funding the political conversation surrounding Maine’s U.S. Senate race do not live here. Yet the people who live, work, raise families, pay taxes and struggle with the state’s challenges every day are being inundated with political advertising financed by interests far removed from their daily lives.
As someone who still watches local television, I can assure you that political advertising remains one of broadcasting’s most reliable revenue streams. Whether voters are any better informed is another question entirely.
The flood of outside money is one reason I find the national coverage of Maine’s Senate race so frustrating.
National reporters and a growing universe of opinion writers have descended on Maine hoping to explain what they view as a political puzzle. How could a challenger carrying significant personal baggage be running competitively against one of the most recognizable and experienced senators in Washington?
The stories often follow a familiar script. Reporters interview voters who express reservations about one candidate while supporting them anyway, or they find equally passionate supporters of the incumbent. The resulting narrative frequently suggests that Maine voters are willing to overlook flaws that would be disqualifying elsewhere. It always seems to boil down to the devil-you-know versus the devil-you-don’t.
What is missing is context.
Maine is the oldest state in the nation. It faces persistent workforce shortages, a severe housing crunch, rising healthcare concerns and vexing economic disparities.
These realities shape how people evaluate candidates. Voters are weighing kitchen-table concerns, local economic conditions, the future of their communities and whether they believe a candidate understands the challenges they face. Most importantly, they want to know what that candidate is willing to do to truly help them.
That kind of understanding rarely comes from parachute journalism.
And that is why local news matters.
With respect to the talented journalists covering national politics, it is the day-in and day-out work of local reporting that creates a meaningful understanding of a community. Covering school boards, housing, environmental issues, fisheries, town councils, infrastructure projects, and public safety may not generate national headlines, but it provides the context needed to make informed decisions.
At its best, local journalism uncovers wrongdoing, informs, educates, uplifts and celebrates the very people and places it is charged with covering.
As citizens, we are asked to consider the totality of every candidate seeking office and decide who best represents our interests. What is less helpful are the 30-second attack ads that dominate modern campaigns. Hundreds of millions of dollars are spent reducing complex issues and complicated human beings into caricatures designed to provoke emotion rather than thoughtful consideration.
The billionaires seem to believe their financial success has anointed them as smarter and more capable of deciding what is best for us. That should surprise no one. But when outside money becomes the dominant voice in a state’s political conversation, we are the worst for it.
The same can happen when national media outlets arrive with a preconceived storyline and then search for evidence to support it. No one is better off as a result.
In my retirement, I spend a great deal of time talking with people across Maine. What I hear most often is not enthusiasm for one political party or another. I hear frustration. I hear disgust.
Some wish they had more choices. Many believe neither party fully understands them. Most are simply looking for leaders who seem willing to listen and demonstrate a genuine understanding of their lives. Everyone wants a fair shot at a decent life for themselves and their children.
They are exactly the conversations local journalism is uniquely positioned to capture.
And that is why local news matters — not because it tells people what to think, but because it helps the rest of us understand what our neighbors are going through. Empathy is in short supply these days, so anything that helps bolster compassion and understanding gets my attention. Local news coverage is that lifeline that illuminates complex issues, explores solutions and exposes the wrongdoing that would otherwise go unchecked.
So, support your local news organizations as if your life depended on it because, in all probability, it does.