WATERVILLE, Maine — Gov. Janet Mills looms over next year’s race against U.S. Sen. Susan Collins. Upstart candidate Graham Platner challenged the national Democrats who want Mills to run when he made a dramatic entrance to the race last month.
The two had not met until they both attended a union coalition’s Labor Day event in Portland. A photo posted by Secretary of State Shenna Bellows’ gubernatorial campaign shows Mills and Platner in the background chatting with two other people at the Southern Maine Labor Council’s annual breakfast in Portland.
“I had never met him before. We talked for, like, two seconds. I asked how his father was doing. His father’s a very prominent lawyer in Hancock County, somebody I’d known for years,” Mills told reporters after speaking to Rotary Club members in Waterville on Monday, referring to retired Ellsworth lawyer Bronson Platner. “That’s it.”
The first interaction between Mills and Platner shows the delicate combat required in Maine politics, where candidates often show up to the same small number of events. Their relationship could take on increased importance while Democrats try to find a candidate who can to beat Collins after throwing a massive race at her but losing in 2020.
Platner’s campaign did not immediately respond to a question about his conversation with Mills. But the oyster farmer from Sullivan, has challenged the governor directly on the trail. He said national Democrats should not follow the “same old, tired playbook” in picking a Senate candidate, also criticizing some of her vetoes during an Ellsworth event on Labor Day.
He gained heavy attention after his August announcement, with his campaign saying he raised $1 million in nine days. He is endorsed by U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont. Maine Beer Co. co-founder Dan Kleban of Cumberland got into the race last week, and political operative Jordan Wood of Bristol has run an active campaign since the spring.
Mills has been publicly considering a run for nearly a year. She told reporters last week that she would decide whether to run by November. In Gardiner on Monday, the 77-year-old governor used perhaps her strongest language to date by saying she was frustrated by policies from President Donald Trump and Republicans and felt anxious to “get stuff done.”
“There’s some very disturbing things going on, every day more so,” she told Maine Public.
National Democrats led by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-New York, have made clear that Mills is their top choice to take on Collins, a Republican who will be running for a historic sixth term in the Senate. But with Maine remaining part of their clearest path to Senate control in 2026, any challenger is likely to draw heavy funding from party interests.
Democratic 2020 challenger Sara Gideon raised more than $74 million in her 2020 race against Collins. That election went above $200 million in total spending. The ad monitoring firm AdImpact is estimating that Maine will see more than $300 million in advertising between next year’s congressional, gubernatorial and legislative elections.
