EAST MILLINOCKET, Maine — Graham Platner entered the race to oust U.S. Sen. Susan Collins last August as an outsider backed by labor leaders with a simple message: The wealthy have rigged the economy and politics in their favor.
Few in Maine had heard of him. He is now the clear favorite in the Democratic primary despite an ad blitz over the past two weeks from Gov. Janet Mills, who is running behind the argument that continued fallout from the fall disclosure of old, offensive Reddit posts and a now-covered tattoo of a skull-and-crossbones symbol tied to Nazis will make him unelectable.
Platner has continued his insurgent-style campaign, holding his 50th town hall-style event last week. He drew roughly 100 people in East Millinocket, a conservative area where several of his supporters fervently rejected the idea that Platner would be a risky choice to take on Collins, a five-term Republican representing a Democratic-leaning state.
One of them, Amanda Fullerton, a 43-year-old in-home health care worker from Lowell, invoked President Donald Trump, who had both a lack of political experience and a lifetime of baggage that he overcame to be elected twice in three campaigns. His rise led her to believe voters “need to think out of the box” if they are upset at Congress.
“There was a time when I would have said, ‘Yeah, that’s a big risk,’” Tom Bozeman, a 42-year-old health care worker, said at the Wednesday event. “But I think there’s a thirst for authenticity and people coming in without handlers.”
Supporters of Mills assert Platner is an untested and largely unvetted candidate who Collins and a well-funded Republican machine would — as the governor said last month — “make mincemeat” of in a general election in which hundreds of millions of dollars will be spent. Mills often points to her track record as Maine’s first woman governor and four terms as attorney general.
But that argument is getting harder to make. After getting a head start on Mills, who was recruited to challenge Collins by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-New York, Platner has far more money than the term-limited governor and has built a consistent polling lead.
In an Emerson College survey of likely Democratic primary voters released Thursday, the 41-year-old military veteran led Mills by 27 percentage points, 55% to 28%. Both Platner and Mills led Collins in hypothetical matchups, but the poll found Democrats faced a tighter race with Mills on the ballot. Another candidate, 2024 Senate nominee David Costello, is in the primary.
In the former mill town on Wednesday, Platner grew emotional as he said he has watched his community “begin to die” over the past few decades. He blamed a political and economic system he said is geared toward benefiting entrenched lawmakers and corporate donors.
He invoked the women’s suffrage movement, and the gay rights and civil rights movements, as examples of the kind of long-term engagement and organizing needed to combat Washington’s longstanding power structure.
“The system isn’t broken, it’s functioning exactly as it was designed,” he said. “We’ve been told a long time that power isn’t for people like us. Power is a speciality [for] people with certain last names or backgrounds in business or education, people with a certain kind of pedigree.”
Platner focused more at Collins than Mills during the town hall, noting the governor’s attacks while noting he would not criticize her on anything but policy. But his words fired up attendees, including supporters and undecided voters who said they simply turned out to hear what he had to say.
“I think the climate that we’re in right now, people are hungry for change,” Fullerton said.
Collins and Republicans have largely stood aside during the primary, building up a massive campaign that is defending the senator on multiple fronts by emphasizing her role as Senate Appropriations Committee chair. After a long and heavily nationalized campaign in 2020, she was able to flip many late-deciding voters by making an argument for her unique attributes.
Both Platner and Mills are trying to make inroads with voters on that front. Trump in a Fox News interview Thursday acknowledged he was not a fan of Collins. But he called her “a good person, actually,” noting “all of the things we’ve done are going to go down the tubes” if she loses and Democrats take control of the Senate.
“Trump hopes Susan Collins wins because he knows she won’t stand up to him,” Mills said on X in response to Trump’s comments.
Asked about voters calling for fresh faces in Washington, Shawn Roderick, a Collins campaign spokesperson, said the senator continues to hear from Mainers appreciative of her work and “the steady leadership that she provides during these tumultuous times.”
Barbara Trafton, a former Democratic state lawmaker and longtime Mills ally, said she understands how outsiders like Platner can appeal to frustrated and angry voters. But she said Mills’ resume serves as a counterpoint to Collins’ “masterful retail politics.”
“[Collins] will be in every town and city [with] the pitch that she has really delivered and made peoples’ lives better,” Trafton said. “Over the past five elections, we’ve put up really good candidates, but they haven’t been able to go toe-to-toe with Susan Collins in terms of her deliverables.”
