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U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont brought his “Fighting Oligarchy” tour back to Portland on Monday night to support Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Graham Platner.
Before anyone else took to the stage at Thompson Point, a Vietnam veteran and anti-war activist named Bill Jefferson led a moment of silence for the crowd of around 1,700 people.
The nearly 80-year-old veteran said he opposed the Vietnam War before, during and after he was drafted — along with any other “forever war” thereafter.
“At age 20, I didn’t want to kill, and nobody could explain the reason why I had to,” he said. “That attitude was not popular, and a lot of my suffering was done in solitude. Like Graham Platner, I took on hard … healing work.”
Platner, an oyster farmer from Sullivan, will likely face incumbent Republican U.S. Sen. Susan Collins in the fall after an expected primary win over David Costello in June.
In a fiery speech to supporters on Memorial Day in Portland, Platner tapped into voter frustrations around the ongoing war with Iran and the rising costs of fuel and other everyday goods.
“Our tax dollars can build schools and hospitals in America instead of bombs to drop on them in Gaza and Iran,” he said to thunderous applause.
Weeks after Gov. Janet Mills suspended her campaign for Senate, Platner has become the main target of Republican attack ads. Many use an archive of old social media posts Platner made starting in 2009 that contain offensive language and some contradictions to his current policy platform.
Platner has since apologized for the comments and deleted his Reddit account.
“I’m the young man who came back with the weight of the forever wars and the alienation and the darkness that came with it, but I am also the man who found my way home,” he said to the crowd. “This state raised me, and this state saved me.”
Platner’s controversies haven’t slowed his campaign. Latest polling data has him 7 points ahead of Collins.
Sanders likened the energy of Platner’s campaign to that of newly elected New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani — who Sanders says mobilized thousands of volunteers.
“Mamdani did that in the most urban part of America, largest city in this country. Maine now has the opportunity to show the world that we could do the same thing in one of the most rural states in this country,” Sanders said.
Sanders also used the latest stop on his “Fighting Oligarchy” tour to support Troy Jackson, one of five Democrats seeking the party nomination in the race for governor.
The former Maine Senate president used his speech to highlight his pro-labor background. He told the story of how in 1998 he protested with northern Maine loggers for better wages while being threatened to be replaced by Canadian workers.
“I was told that the government works for those people that played by the rules, but, but government only works for power and influence — the power of people who can write the biggest checks,” Jackson told supporters. “I ran for office to change that.”
Both Platner and Jackson align with Sanders on the issues of universal healthcare, workers’ rights, and improving access to affordable child care and housing.
Sanders’ speech repeatedly compared the everyday American to some of the country’s most wealthy, saying the majority of citizens live paycheck to paycheck and that despite being the wealthiest country in the world, the U.S. ranks 35th in child poverty.
Sanders said, if Platner is elected, he expects him to support a proposed 5% annual wealth tax on 938 billionaires in the U.S.
“These guys have so much wealth, and they’re using their wealth to create more power for themselves to make sure that the Congress does not stand up to them,” Sanders said. “But beginning to take them on can transform this country from top to bottom.”
This story appears through a media partnership with Maine Public.
