Democrats expressed confusion and frustration after activists in Hancock County announced a Labor Day rally featuring former U.S. Senate nominee Graham Platner with many in the party looking to leave him behind after a rape allegation ended his campaign.
Sources said the announcement caught the campaign of the new nominee, former Maine Senate President Troy Jackson, by surprise. The mix-up lands at a pivotal moment for him as he races to build a national operation against five-term Republican Sen. Susan Collins in one of the most closely watched Senate races in the country.
Republicans have spent weeks trying to tie Jackson to Platner even as Jackson has opened a slim lead over Collins in early polling. Any fresh attention on the former nominee threatens to undercut that effort just as national Democrats rally behind him.
“I don’t know what they were thinking,” former Maine Democratic Party Vice Chair Peggy Schaffer said. “He’s not an elected official, not a union member, and he’s an accused rapist.”
Hancock County Activists, a progressive group that regularly holds events with others like it in the region, is hosting the rally. It’s scheduled for Sept. 7 outside Ellsworth City Hall, with Platner slated to speak “about the history of unions and the role organized labor plays in communities across the country,” according to an event announcement.
The Hancock County Democratic Committee promoted the event on Facebook and Instagram on Thursday morning. Both posts were taken down within a few hours, though the event remained listed on the county committee’s website as of Thursday afternoon.
Platner who did not immediately respond to a voicemail. Messages left with the Hancock County Democratic Committee and Hancock County Activists were not returned.
Schaffer, who backed Gov. Janet Mills over Platner in the Senate race, called the move by local organizers and Platner “an unforced error” at a time when “the party and Troy have been working diligently to make their campaign about him and Collins. Nobody needs this.”
State Rep. Marc Malon, D-Biddeford, weaved into a social media post Thursday a plug for Jackson and a critique of Collins’ record while saying a “rump band of rogue idiots in Hancock County [invited] a disgraced ex-politician to speak.”
A pivotal seat in the fight for control of the Senate, the race is heating up with the five-term Collins and Republicans targeting Jackson’s past behavior and linking him with Platner. Jackson, who led Collins 48%-46% in a Fox News poll released Tuesday, has denounced the senator’s voting record and ties to President Donald Trump and his agenda.
Platner has kept a low profile since dropping out of the Senate race after his ex-girlfriend made the rape allegation in early July. Maine Democrats and national party leaders urged Platner to withdraw and quickly embraced Jackson, who was a Platner ally but called on him to leave the race in July and has said he would not accept his endorsement.
“I don’t think it’s a good idea,” Jordan Wood, who ran for the Senate and House earlier this year and is working to elect Jackson and other Democrats, said in an interview about the rally. “I think it’s important for the many Democratic campaigns to move on from that. Highlighting him at an event is unproductive and unhelpful for those campaigns.”