Maine Senate Thunderdome Here We Come?
Staring down the prospect of a candidate in a critical race having to be swapped out in July, with four months to go before the general election, Democrats might be feeling some PTSD.
But even before multiple outlets reported a sexual assault accusation Monday night (which Graham Platner denies), there were signs that Platner’s polling was weakening — the result of a months-long drumbeat of scandals, exhausting Democrats of all political stripes.
Still, most polls show the party retains a lead on the generic ballot. Mainers appear to want to send a Democrat to the upper chamber. And under state rules, Platner has until Monday to drop out. State Democrats would then have until the fourth Monday in July — July 27 — to name a replacement candidate, a delicate process that has the potential to anger everyone. (Josh Marshall described proposals for a flash convention to replace Biden in 2024 as “thunderdome” politics — something like that might be in the offing for Maine as well.)
Janet Mills, reportedly, is unlikely to be that replacement candidate, given her sleepy primary campaign. Most attention has focused on candidates who lost the governor primary — Nirav Shah, who led the state’s public health response through COVID; Troy Jackson, a former president of the Maine Senate; and Shenna Bellows, the current secretary of state, who lost to Susan Collins in the Senate race in 2014.
But first, Platner has to choose to withdraw. Abandoned by the state and federal party campaign organizations and most high-profile allies, he would seem to have little choice. Still, he wants to exercise some influence over his successor, a “person familiar” told the New York Times last night.
“If he was to step down it would only be with a guarantee of being replaced by a candidate who he believes is true to the values and vision and policy agenda of the campaign that Maine voted for,” that person said.
July 13 is fast approaching.
SAVE Act Switcheroo, Pt. II
As Emine Yücel reported yesterday, Mike Johnson is once again floating the idea of doing President Trump’s SAVE America Act through the budget reconciliation process.
We saw an attempt to do this in the spring, as well. Its a story that fascinates me because it seems to be a clear attempt to basically pull the wool over Trump’s eyes and declare the SAVE America Act passed without actually passing it in anything like it’s current form.
Let me explain:
- Budget reconciliation is a process that lets the Senate pass legislation with a 50-vote majority, so long as it is related to the budget.
- The SAVE America Act, a sweeping voter suppression bill, is not related to the budget.
- So in order to do something called “the SAVE America Act” through budget reconciliation, the Senate would have to agree to (a) blow up how the body functions and, potentially, fire the parliamentarian — something for which Sen. Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) has said he has no appetite — or (b) pass something that is not the SAVE America Act but that they call “the SAVE America Act” through reconciliation.
- The times this plan has surfaced, its backers seem to land on option B: potentially some kind of block grants (budget related!) to states that impose voter ID laws and let the federal government review their voter rolls. Such a plan is very much not the SAVE America Act, an attempted federal government takeover of voting.
- The whole back and forth tells us a lot about Trump-era politics. Trump’s allies in Congress seem to be betting the president won’t have the attention to detail to distinguish between his signature bill (which cannot get through reconciliation) and something that is very much not his signature bill (which can). Getting Trump off congressional leaders’ backs seems to be the animating objective.
- At the same time, it’s playing with fire. The SAVE America Act is no joke. Any renewed Republican attempt to pass it in any form — however farcical — is worth watching.
Tabs
- Mitch McConnell’s office released a statement yesterday that the 84-year-old former Senate Majority Leader “continues to improve, and is working closely with his staff on Kentucky and Senate matters while the Senate is out of session.” But few specifics about his condition following his hospitalization on June 14 are known.
- The bipartisan housing bill, which Trump refused to sign without action on the SAVE America Act, is on track to simply become law without a signature or veto from him, Semafor reports.
- “A group that says it represents more than 1,500 congressional staffers is pressing House and Senate leaders to overhaul how Capitol Hill handles sexual misconduct complaints,” the Washington Post reports.
Man of the Hour
It’s Graham Platner for staying in the race through July despite knowing what was coming.
(For those readers just joining the brief today, this category is, shall we say, an ironic one.)
https://forums.talkingpointsmemo.com/t/on-the-ground-in-maine-graham-platner/259572/2438
My dumb-ass predictions.
Platner drops out today, 07/07/2026.
Platner’s wife files for divorce within the next year.
For those who accuse Ms. Racicot of waiting suspiciously long to drop this news, maybe she did intentionally wait. In this often misogynistic culture, perhaps she felt this was the only way to be heard of what happened to here. She is now being heard, and she is also exacting a form a justice on this man who injured her in a society that still, all too often, sweeps this shit under the rug and rewards the rapists.
Free to read
Who Might Replace Graham Platner if He Drops Out of the Maine Senate Race? - The New York Times
Top Maine Democratic Party officials have discussed possible plans to replace Mr. Platner on the ballot, with options including a pop-up convention on the weekend of July 25 to choose a nominee, or holding a statewide caucus to effectively redo the party’s primary election, according to two people who have talked with the officials and spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal party conversations.
Officials have ruled out having the state party’s committee, which includes about 100 members, choose the nominee, the people said.
Should Mr. Platner withdraw by next Monday, the leading candidates to replace him could potentially include the Democrats who ran for governor and did not win the primary.
They include Ms. Bellows, Troy Jackson, a former president of the Maine Senate, and Nirav Shah, a former director of Maine’s public health agency. Jordan Wood, who lost a primary for a House district covering northern Maine, is also a potential candidate.
Ms. Mills is seen as less likely to be selected. She did not respond to messages on Monday.
Platner needs to drop out today, right now, if he wants to preserve any shred of respect from the party and Mainers in general. There is no sense in waiting a few more days, making it even harder to find a new candidate.
… that seems to be absolutely essential - otherwise Platner becomes the unalterable candidate -on the non-stop trip to the November general election.
At the moment there appears to be a monumental problem - currently Platner is demanding - before he will withdraw - that he be able to judge whether the proposed candidate truly follows the principles that Platner represents and that the people of Maine selected in the primary.
This just doesn’t work if:
(1.)Platner needs to withdraw before Monday the 13th …
and
(2.) a new candidate won’t be named until a mini-convention in late July
There’s going to have to be a whole lot of political sausages made over the next 6 days if there any chance of avoiding disaster!