A handful of Democrat says they’re coming for Maine Senator Susan Collins’ seat. But first they have to capture the soul of the Democratic party.

Guests

Steve Mistler, chief political correspondent and State House bureau chief at Maine Public Radio.

Ronald Schmidt, professor of political science at the University of Southern Maine.

Also Featured

Janet Mills, governor of Maine and Democratic candidate for Senate.

Graham Platner, oysterman and Democratic candidate for Senate.

Dan Shea, professor of government at Colby College.

The version of our broadcast available at the top of this page and via podcast apps is a condensed version of the full show. You can listen to the full, unedited broadcast here:

Transcript

Part I

MEGHNA CHAKRABARTI: The 2026 midterms may be over a year away, but in Maine things are already getting spicy.

The fracture is going to be between that energy that really wants to make the party what it should be, and the entrenched power where it currently stands.

Nobody pulls my strings. Nobody in D.C. Not Chuck Schumer or Bernie Sanders or Donald Trump. People may know that too.

CHAKRABARTI: That was Democratic Senate hopeful Graham Platner first and current Maine governor Janet Mills second. Mills is the state’s current governor, and she announced her candidacy earlier this week. She’s a champion of the State’s Democratic Party and a stalwart member of the state’s political class.

A seasoned public servant who’s been successful in two statewide campaigns. Most recently, she defeated Paul LePage, the former governor and pro-Trump conservative.

Now, Graham Platner is a different character, an oyster farmer, and former marine infantryman. He launched his campaign back in August. Morris Katz, a senior advisor for New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani helped create Platner’s launch video, and by the start of September, Platner had been featured in national outlets, including the New York Times, Newsweek, and Rolling Stone.

The Democratic field also still contains former congressional aide Jordan Wood, but Governor Mills’ entry into the race cause brewery co-founder Dan Kleban to drop out earlier this week.

Now they’re all running against Maine’s longtime Senator Republican Susan Collins.

And given the balance of power in the Senate, that’s what has put the main Senate race squarely in the headlines this early in the election season.

As Dan Shea, a professor of government at Colby College says, if you’re having 2020 primary flashbacks, you’re not alone.

DAN SHEA: I think Democrats are caught once again. And trying to, on the one hand, bring in something new, something different, but on the other hand, finally taking control of the seat, right? Finally beating Susan Collins.

CHAKRABARTI: Now a little bit later in the show, we’re gonna hear a little bit more from Governor Mills, but let’s start by talking about Graham Platner, because if he is the, quote, something new candidate, he seems to be wearing that shirt fairly well.

In late September, Platner took the stage at a local brewery in Ellsworth, Maine. Population, just over 8,000. He wore a sweater, blue jeans and tan baseball cap. His campaign had said they expected around 200 people to show up, but more than 800 registered for the event. And although Platner had just spoken to a crowd of thousands in Portland, Maine, he acknowledged that this Ellsworth event was different.

PLATNER: I was like, I did this in Portland in front of 7,000, and that was easy. And then I realized I didn’t know anybody. So now I have to see everybody I recognize. Hey Jackie.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: No pressure.

PLATNER: No pressure.

CHAKRABARTI: That appearance was one of a series of town halls Platner’s holding throughout the state of Maine, and it took only a little bit of time before he lit into Senator Susan Collins and her connection to working class voters.

PLATNER: At this very moment our campaign now has more town halls than Susan Collins in the last 25 years.

CHAKRABARTI: And Platner almost immediately laid into his own party, the Democratic Party as well.

PLATNER: Support must be earned and that will not happen for the Democratic party until it ceases to be part of the same corporate apparatus that the Republican Party has been for quite some time.

CHAKRABARTI: Amen. That was just the first couple of minutes of Platner’s 44 minute address. So let’s turn to Steve Mistler. He’s the Chief Political Correspondent and State House Bureau chief with Maine Public Radio, and he joins us from Maine Public Radio’s State House Bureau in Augusta. Steve was at that town hall in Ellsworth and provided us that tape.

Steve, welcome to On Point.

STEVE MISTLER: My pleasure, Meghna.

CHAKRABARTI: It’s really great to have you. For non-Mainers, how atypical was that town hall for a main midterm meeting?

MISTLER: I have never seen anything like it honestly, and I could say the same for the other town halls that Graham Platner has held across the state.

Normally when candidates announce and launch their campaigns, there’s a video, which was the case with Platner. And there may be some limited media availability. And then, some candidates also do town halls. I think Jordan Wood, he’s done a town hall in all 16 counties in this state.

He launched earlier this year. I think he was one of the first candidates to get in. But he has not drawn the same kind of crowds that Graham Platner has. And maybe some of that has to do with Platner’s sort of delivery and charisma, that sort of thing. That Ellsworth campaign town hall was something extraordinary. Because it was a small beer garden at a local brewery, and there were actually people directing traffic. There was a parking lot adjacent to it that was filled with people because they couldn’t sandwich themselves into the brewery beer garden.

And there were people on the street. Behind the stage watching this guy, that few people, in that particular setting, a lot of people have probably already heard of him, was a hometown crowd for him. But that’s been replicated all across the state and sometimes in red, deep red areas, including in Caribou, which is of course Susan Collins’s hometown.

It wasn’t drawing, several hundred, but maybe 200 or so showed up. On a very beautiful day in Aroostook County and a pretty small town too.

CHAKRABARTI: Yeah. So we’ll talk in a minute about what’s driving the Platner campaign here, Steve, but let’s educate us a little bit more about him.

I picked the sort of headlining parts of his background being a oyster farmer, peak Maine there, and a marine infantryman. But who is Platner and what about him do you think is garnering so much interest?

MISTLER: I think the two things. First of all, he was recruited by local labor activists in the state.

And I think that’s part of the reason why he’s garnered so much support from the progressive wing of the Democratic party. And he was quickly endorsed by Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, who gave him basically a prime speaking spot at a huge Labor Day rally in Portland.

I think there was something like 7,500 people there. And I think actually Platner alluded to that crowd in that Ellsworth tape. And so he’s, I think he’s that sort of backing and the professional campaign staff that he has working for him has created this opportunity for the candidate where he’s channeling a lot of this angst at the Democratic establishment.

And of course, talking about Senator Susan Collins too, which is, she’s been this sort of white whale for Democrats ever since she was elected to Congress in 1996. And in 2020, what was interesting, because you mentioned ’20, I think Dan Shea had mentioned 2020, there was, back then there was a well-financed democratic challenger that tried to take on Senator Collins.

Senator Susan Collins too, which is, she’s been this sort of white whale for Democrats ever since she was elected to Congress in 1996.

A lot of money was spent in that race and Joe Biden won the state handily. But the Democratic challenger fell by more than eight points in that context.

CHAKRABARTI: In the senate race.

MISTLER: Correct.

CHAKRABARTI: Yeah, there was a lot of gasping before that election that maybe that would be the year that Susan Collins didn’t win.

Because the polling seemed close, but she handily won that race and now she’s up for reelection again. We’re gonna talk more about her and how Mainers see her in just a second. But has Platner ever held a political office?

MISTLER: No, unless you count Harbor Master, and I think he was on the planning board in Sullivan, which is a town of just over a thousand souls.

He still holds the title of Harbor Master, which is an elected position.

CHAKRABARTI: So technically yes, he has held elected.

MISTLER: So that’s it.

CHAKRABARTI: I’m not laughing at the position of Harbor Master. It’s important. But it’s not necessarily on the same scale as being a senator from a state. So he was recruited then.

Alright. But how can you gauge as a political reporter, what his politics actually are? He was recruited by labor, but is he a Mamdani type, Democratic progressive? It was interesting that someone from the Mamdani crew actually helped him with his launch video.

MISTLER: Yeah, I think, I wouldn’t, I think he would reject that label.

He rejects the progressive label in its entirety. Although he does talk, he does have a platform that looks very much, say, Bernie Sanders. It’s very much pro-labor. It’s anti oligarchy, which is a core piece of his message, taxing the rich, basically. Handing power back into giving power back into the hands of working-class Mainers.

These are the core of his message, that and of course going after the Democratic establishment. And I think that’s essentially what he’s using to channel this. This energy in the Democratic Party or among the Democratic base is just, it’s a very basic message at this point.

He does have a detailed platform. But people really aren’t talking about that as much as they’re just talking about the clarity of his message. And the way in which he delivers it. And I think that’s one of the reasons why he’s caught fire. Despite the fact that he, again, his political experience has been limited to Harbor Master.

CHAKRABARTI: Okay. So you talked about essentially an economic populist message.

MISTLER: That’s right.

CHAKRABARTI: But the thing that was the anchor or the yoke around the Democrats neck in the last election where President Trump was reelected was the message on social issues, for example, where does Platner stand on those?

Does he even talk about them?

MISTLER: Not as much. But he has said, he’s been very strident about defending LGBTQ rights. He doesn’t want to, he wants to protect those folks, and he would not compromise his principles on that, he says. I don’t know so much about his other, like other social issues. He doesn’t, we don’t, there’s not a lot of discussion about, say, trans rights necessarily, or trans athletes in sports or that sort of thing. That really hasn’t come up. I suspect it will in a general election if he gets to that point. But that’s not really a core part of his message.

It really is pocketbook issues. And as you mentioned, basically economic populism and a big piece of that, of course, is going after the very wealthy.

Part II

CHAKRABARTI: Let’s listen to a couple of voters from the state. This is Scott. He’s an army veteran who says he’ll likely support Graham Platner. And he also has a common critique, or he is a giving voice to a common critique of Senator Collins among Maine liberals.

SCOTT: Susan Collins comes across in a fairly disingenuous way. There’s a lot of people that are frustrated with her vote as the appropriations committee head, that allowed the big bill to go through. While then when it doesn’t matter, she votes against it, which is fairly consistent with her.

CHAKRABARTI: Now, Steven is a former Mainer. He now lives in Vermont, and he says that even if a person disagrees with Senator Collins’ positions, she has been a force within the Senate.

STEVEN: Senator Collins historically has used her office to provide a small state, a significant voice in the national narrative, and I suppose that reflects Maine’s values as one of only two states, I believe, that allow the splitting of electoral votes. And I’m excited to see how this plays out.

CHAKRABARTI: Steve, do you want to just comment quickly about that on the splitting of Maine’s electoral votes?

And it’s interesting that Kevin brought that into his calculus about the Senate race.

MISTLER: Yeah, Maine is one of just two states that splits its electoral votes based on a candidate, a presidential candidate’s performance in a congressional district. That’s not the way it works in a Senate race.

But if you’re running for president, you have a chance to basically garner one electoral vote in Maine’s more conservative, second congressional district, or its first congressional district. And Donald Trump has done that in each election that he’s run. So he’s won the second congressional district three times, including in 2020 when he lost the presidential race that year, he still lost statewide and in the aggregate of the votes.

But he was able to win at least one in the second congressional district, and I think the second congressional district, even though there’s no splitting of electoral votes in the Senate race does loom large here. Because it really is an entity of its own in a lot of ways. And people talk a lot here about there being two Maines and some people don’t like that talk because it’s divisive or it just makes it sound like we’re not one big community.

But it is. There is some truth to that, and I think that’s also one, that’s a prime dynamic in this race, in this senate race because. Janet Mills has won state two statewide races here pretty handily and held her own in the second congressional district.

And not many Democratic candidates can lay claim to that.

CHAKRABARTI: Okay. Earlier before this week, most of the national political trackers that were giving their predictions, I know more than a year before, before the midterms, but giving their predictions about Maine were saying leaning Senator Collins.

But this week when Governor Janet Mills announced her candidacy for the Senate race. A lot of those now turned into a tossup call. So here’s why. As you mentioned, Steve, Governor Mills is the most established and of the establishment, I would say, of the Democratic candidates. She entered the national spotlight earlier this year with a bold interaction with President Trump at the White House and the president was threatening to withhold federal funding from states that failed to comply with his executive order banning transgender athletes from sports.

DONALD TRUMP: You better comply because otherwise you’re not getting any federal funding.

JANET MILLS: See you in court.

TRUMP: Every state. Good. I’ll see you in court. I look forward to that.

That should be a real easy one. And enjoy your life after governor. Because I don’t think you’ll be in elected politics.

CHAKRABARTI: So the person who said See you in court was indeed Governor Mills. Now we spoke with Mills earlier this week and she said, quote, the dangerous times we’re in, compelled her to enter the race against Senator Susan Collins.

JANET MILLS: I don’t think I could live with myself if I didn’t take this on. Take the fight to Susan Collins and to the United States Senate and stand up to Donald Trump. Which this Congress is not doing.

I don’t think I could live with myself if I didn’t take this on. Take the fight to Susan Collins and to the United States Senate and stand up to Donald Trump.

Janet Mills

CHAKRABARTI: Senator Collins, as we mentioned earlier, has run what seemed like close races before and won them handily in 2020.

Some polling had indicated that Collins was vulnerable to Democratic candidate Sara Gideon of Freeport, Maine, and yet Senator Collins kept her seat with more than 51% of the vote. Gideon took just 42%. Now, Governor Mills, though, is unfazed.

MILLS: I’ve delivered progress for Maine people. I’ve delivered expanding health care for Maine people, for 100,000 people on day one of my governorship. I’ve delivered on education, fully funding education for the first time in history, providing two free years of community college for recent high school grads. That’s a first. Providing universal free meals in the public schools.

That’s a first. I’ve delivered in so many ways. I’m the only person in this race who’s actually been elected to anything.

CHAKRABARTI: Now Mills previously served before she was governor as Attorney General in Maine. And as Steve Mistler had mentioned in 2018, Mills actually flipped the governor’s seat winning that year by seven points.

And in 2022, she was reelected handily by 13 points. She’s term limited and cannot serve as governor again. And she told us that she expects the primary to strengthen the candidacy of whichever Democrat wins the primary and eventually faces off against Senator Collins. But as you heard a little earlier, Mills says her track record is what gives her an edge over Graham Platner when it comes to addressing one of the race’s biggest areas of concern: the economy.

MILLS: I’ve implemented apprenticeship programs that have trained up thousands of young people, not just in the trades, but in technology, in non-traditional employment areas. Funding education is extremely important to increasing people’s financial capacity and their careers and their future, and that’s where I look to encouraging economic development.

I’ve also been able to efficiently use COVID related funds, for instance, not only to secure apprenticeships, both union and non-union apprenticeships and internships for young people, but to supplement the needs of small businesses. And during hard times, we also gave back money to the taxpayers.

CHAKRABARTI: So you hear Governor Mills there focusing on her local record, but National Democrats have been clamoring for her to enter the race. POLITICO reported this week that, quote, Chuck Schumer got his preferred candidate, end quote. The Senate minority leader had, quote, aggressively recruited Mills to run this cycle. So we asked the governor if it was Schumer’s influence that convinced her to launch her campaign.

MILLS: Chuck Schumer, I think I met him. I met him once in my whole life and it was seven or eight months ago. And did he encourage me? Sure, he did. That’s great. He encouraged Roy Cooper too, as did I. Because I know Roy, he encouraged Sherrod Brown, as did I.

CHAKRABARTI: You hear Mills rejecting the assertion that her established ties to the Democratic Party and her record make her the candidate who represents the current national brand of democratic politics.

MILLS: There is nothing that Chuck Schumer has said that has caused me to make this decision. It’s the people of Maine and it’s my own deliberations that have caused me to take this leap and make the case for myself to the Maine people. I expect to go out and earn every vote as I always have done in the past, by talking to people directly.

CHAKRABARTI: So that was Maine current governor, Janet Mills. Steve, let me ask you, there’s been in the national presses, there’s been a lot of assertion that there’s just a heavy push to get Mills to run for the senate race, but now we have more context. She can’t run for governor again.

She’s also 77. So maybe regardless of what the Senate minority leader wants, was the stage set for Mills to want to try to run for congressional office?

MISTLER: I think the stage was set, Meghna, when in the confrontation with the president back in February. I really think that was it, for two reasons.

One is it really put the governor on the national map, it raised her national profile. And because it came at a time when I think a lot of Democrats in particular were looking for somebody, anybody, to stand up to the president. And here was this governor from Maine that maybe not that many people had heard of prior to that confrontation.

And it really did, I mean, like just the exposure she had from the national press over that confrontation. It really did force her into this conversation about running for the Senate. In fact, there was a lot of inquiries about her interest in doing that, right in the immediate aftermath of this, of the confrontation at the White House.

And she struck me all along as being deeply ambivalent about running for the U.S. Senate. And part of that is just, I think, she’s very much connected to this state, as she very much loves being in the state, and she told me just even over the summer, I think it was back in late July, that being in D.C. was never really something that was high on her list of priorities, especially right now when it’s so chaotic.

I’m paraphrasing, of course. But things have changed since then. And of course, when she launched her campaign, she featured that confrontation with the president prominently. It really led, it led her introduction ad or introduction video, and I think there’s a reason for that.

One is that it reinforces her bonafides as a fighter. And also, I think that’s really important right now. Because I think the Democratic base is looking for that. I think it’s another reason why they’ve looked to Graham Platner, because he talks like a fighter.

But the governor as you laid out is, has been very much a part of the Democratic party in this state. She’s the most recognizable name in the state, and she has a record of achievements that she can stack up against. And in this case, all of the candidates who don’t have any of those things right now.

CHAKRABARTI: Well, Steve, hang on for just a second because I want to make two notes. One is that we also spoke with Graham Platner. We’ll hear a little bit from him in a few minutes. But I also want to bring in Ronald Schmidt now. He’s a professor of political science at the University of Southern Maine. Joining us from Portland.

Professor Ronald Schmidt, welcome to you.

RONALD SCHMIDT: Hi Meghna. Thanks a lot for having me on.

CHAKRABARTI: So you just heard Steve very accurately describe governor Mills’s political track record in Maine, which would seem to be in her favor, versus Platner in the primaries who hasn’t held any kind of statewide office. But on the other hand, when we take a look at establishment Democrats nationwide, I think the last election especially showed that people are looking for more than a Democrat who says that their raison d’être for running is just simply to oppose Donald Trump. Could that be a handicap for Governor Mills?

SCHMIDT: That could and that’s true.

Just running a campaign that’s in opposition to a particular politician hasn’t been a great formula for Democrats, even in the age of Trump. Governor Mills does, though, have other advantages in the way she frames her candidacy. I’ve lived a lot of places where people like to talk about their political independence from party. And there are certainly fewer Democrats and Republicans in the country than there used to be, but that even independents tend to solidly vote for one party or the other. In Maine for whatever reason, voters do seem to be open to a kind of nonpartisan or bipartisan story that’s worked in Collins’s advantage in the past.

Just running a campaign that’s in opposition to a particular politician hasn’t been a great formula for Democrats, even in the age of Trump.

Ronald Schmidt

And Mills is not conservative, but she is a more traditional Democrat, I guess you’d say. And she does pride herself on working with interests within Maine that are conservative as well as progressive. And that story might benefit her over the more partisan message of Graham Platner.

CHAKRABARTI: We are obviously focusing on the Democrats. Because they’re going to have to fight it out in the primary. But I just want to make a quick question or note about Senator Collins because to your point, professor Schmidt. Senator Collins, A, she’s been in the Senate for Maine for a long time.

I think next year it’ll be 30 years. B, even though she votes pretty much along party lines very frequently, you heard that caller that listener earlier saying that he was just really upset by her vote in favor of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. She’s also though one of the tiny number of Republicans who voted twice to convict Donald Trump in his two impeachment trials.

That makes her not a typical Republican to have to run against, no matter where you position yourself as a Democratic opponent. Professor Schmidt, what do you think about that?

SCHMIDT: That’s true. Senator Collins is more, I guess you’d say bipartisan or willing to cross her own party than pretty much any other Republican in the Senate. But we should note that says a lot more about Republicans in the Senate than it does about Senator Collins.

CHAKRABARTI: But how does that play in terms of the main electorate though?

SCHMIDT: The Maine electorate seems to like it. Senator Collins has managed to build a winning reelection coalition out of not just Republicans and Republican leaning Independents, but even Democratic leaning Independents. And some just regular, all over the place Independents. And that’s given her a certain amount of independence, of sort of freedom, I guess you’d say, of to cross President Trump and other national GOPers.

CHAKRABARTI: So Steve, let me go back to you. Because like it or not, we do have that last Senate election that you talked about, that 2020 election where Collins ended up winning handily against Sara Gideon. It was a super expensive race, $64 million. Sara Gideon’s campaign spent to try to defeat Collins and wasn’t successful.

Like what lessons do you think the Democrats need to learn from that race?

MISTLER: That’s a good question. I think what was decisive in that race was Maine’s famously fickle and decisive independent voting bloc, and they don’t vote. They’re not a monolith either.

I think Ron alluded to that and talking about the types of Independents that we have in this state. But I think ultimately you can make the case that Collins won that race late, for one. And which would explain why the polling seemed to be such a big miss that year. I think Independents broke for her late, and I think one of the reasons why is because of her ascension on the appropriations or budget committee in the Senate, which has or had a lot of influence obviously and where money is directed to the states.

And then, and she campaigned on that almost exclusively. So you had this race where Sara Gideon and the National Democrats were trying to nationalize the race, trying to frame Collins as being a tool of President Trump or not being totally honest about how she felt about President Trump.

And then Collins really just talking locally about what she does for Maine people and what she would be able to do as chair of the appropriations committee.

Part III

CHAKRABARTI: Now, you heard Governor Mills earlier in this hour. We also spoke with Platner. Now he is the most prominent now, officially the most prominent oyster farmer from Maine.

And as we heard, he’s building a campaign as an economic populist, someone who is willing to call for accountability among Republicans and Democrats as well.

PLATNER: The leadership of the party in Washington, instead of recognizing that feeling and recognizing where the energy is, they want to fight it tooth and nail.

And I think it’s the wrong move.

CHAKRABARTI: Platner says he supports policies that increase affordable housing, broaden social security, and increase taxes on corporations and the wealthy.

PLATNER: I do not believe, certainly in a place like Eastern Maine, where I know people that have three or four jobs, where they work with their hands on the ocean.

I don’t believe that anybody works so much harder than them, that they made all that money themselves and that people that work three or four jobs don’t have the right to have access to health care. That seems utterly absurd to me, and I think that we tackle that through reforming the tax code.

CHAKRABARTI: As you heard earlier, Platner is not at all as well politically established as Governor Mills. He hasn’t held any kind of statewide office, but he says his position gets not just to the core of the Democratic Party, but it appeals to people who traditionally vote against them.

PLATNER: My Trump voting neighbors agree with this.

Like my Trump voting neighbors think that taxing corporations to provide money for a health care industry, that would actually provide health care and not just be a mechanism of getting an insurance executive extra rich, they agree with all of that. Now, nobody’s going to accuse them of being progressives.

They voted for Donald Trump three times, but they think that’s a good idea.

CHAKRABARTI: Platner believes there is a schism between voters in the Democratic party and the party’s leadership.

But he says his potential success lies with those very voters.

PLATNER: I have an immense amount of faith that the people that represent the Democratic Party want it to be the party it’s supposed to be.

I have an immense amount of faith that the people that represent the Democratic Party want it to be the party it’s supposed to be.

Graham Platner

They want it to be the party of the working class. They want it to be the party of unions. They want to be the party of community organizations. They want to be the party of civil rights. That is the party that many Democrats joined, and they want to be, want it to be that again. And I think candidacies like my own and a few others around the country are showing that when you show up with that kind of message, people are excited and they turn out.

CHAKRABARTI: So that’s Maine Democratic Senate candidate, Graham Platner. Professor Ronald Schmidt. You basically heard Platner there describe a Democratic party that didn’t use the word elite or corporations, et cetera, et cetera. Really trying to separate himself from what people may seem to popularly believe the center of the party is now.

He says that’s resonating a lot with Maine voters. Do you think so as well?

SCHMIDT: In the polling data, one thing that stands out right now is that Susan Collins looks vulnerable. But she’s looked vulnerable before, as you’ve pointed out a couple of times. And so the big question for the party in Maine right now is what Plattner spoke to at the very end of his comments, which is energy and turnout.

I think a lot of Maine Democrats would agree with the policy outlines that he described there. But the question is that what’s going to get them fired up enough to be a big presence between now and next year when the midterms happen? And will that make them turn out to actually vote?

Vote participation rates are good compared to the rest of the nation, but a lot will ride on who has the most excitement and who has the most commitment over a year from now.

Vote participation rates are good compared to the rest of the nation, but a lot will ride on who has the most excitement and who has the most commitment over a year from now.

Ronald Schmidt

CHAKRABARTI: Steve Mistler, how much do you think that Maine Democratic voters, just to focus a little bit on them, are also feeling the same kind of frustration that Platner believes that they are. And the reason why I ask that is because it’s one thing for primary voters to say, we want to change, we want a new generation, et cetera, et cetera. But even within the demo or registered Democratic voters, not everyone votes in the primaries. How much do you think that could play in a general election?

MISTLER: I think it could be decisive, right? I think that, and I’m not quite sure like how, yeah, I mean in this we do have semi open primaries this year, so that could be a good test of just participation. If you see a lot of unenrolled or Independents, going to vote in the Democratic primary, that could be a sign.

And especially if they end up voting for Graham Platner, that type of energy is something that could carry him, or through the general election and actually mount a serious challenge against Senator Collins. So I’m not sure, but in talking to voters, either at his town halls and some of these folks go to these town halls and they’re not sure about who he is and what he stands for.

I talked to a couple of those in Caribou at this, again, that’s Susan Collins’s hometown and a couple of these folks, they live in, this is a far-flung part of the state. It’s like driving, it’s the same miles to drive from Portland to New York as it is to drive to these places in Aroostook County.

There’s a feeling of neglect sometimes. And so there’s a lot of people that were really open to his message that weren’t necessarily Democrats. They were Independents. And I made, I was trying to find voters at these places that weren’t already volunteers for Platner or weren’t already holding signs or taking those home with them.

And the people that I did find did have a very similar message, which is that they just want something different. And that the message, even though it does sound a little bit like Bernie Sanders at times does resonate with him. And I would say that, yeah, I would just add that about Bernie Sanders is that he did have a lot of crossover appeal in this state.

There’s a reason why President Trump, before he was president in 2016, or before he won the presidency in 2016, was openly courting Bernie Sanders supporters after Hillary Clinton won the primary. He thought, and he believed that Sanders supporters might go to him.

And whether or not that happened, I’m not sure, but I think Graham Platner’s campaign is very much banking on the idea that he does have crossover appeal, as you heard him mentioned in that clip.

Graham Platner’s campaign is very much banking on the idea that he does have crossover appeal.

Steve Mistler

CHAKRABARTI: Professor Schmidt, though, what’s fascinating to me is that maybe the Mills campaign could argue that, look, she’s talking about all the same economic, populist positions, and she also has her record as governor to show that. You heard her assert it earlier in the show that she’s actually delivered on some of that, that the only difference would be she’s been able to deliver. But that she’s not, quote-unquote, that fresh face that Steve talked about.

So I guess what I’m trying to get at, what do people actually want? Are they just in the, like, we just want someone different mode. Even if that person, even if the two candidates are essentially promising policy-wise, the same things Professor Schmidt?

SCHMIDT: Yeah, that’s to me who is not actually born and bred in Maine.

This is one of the fascinating things about this moment, because on the one hand you’ve got this very particular Maine tradition of liking candidates who aren’t self-defined as very partisan. And who talk a lot about being able to reach out to other Mainers for their support and their interest at a time when this particular race is of great national importance, right? This is one of the Democrat’s only chances to take back the Senate. And so a lot is riding on the question of whether Mainers still want a candidate in the mold of Janet Mills, or if they want someone who looks more like a kind of national populist.

CHAKRABARTI: So Steve Mistler, I’m glad that Professor Schmidt brought that up because also I was reading this week that the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, the DSCC has actually made an FEC filing along with Mills for Maine, meaning that they’re preparing to spend money for her.

Now the DSCC says in a formal statement that they have not made any formal endorsements, but that national money is poised to flow in at a time where both of the major Democratic candidates, Mills and Platner, are gonna do everything they can to separate themselves from the National Party.

MISTLER: Yeah, that’s right.

I think it’s going to be a very tricky balancing act for the governor. Because again, because you’ve mentioned this joint fundraising committee, which was literally established the day she got into the race, and at a time when she’s trying to make this, create distance between her and Leader Schumer or Minority Leader Schumer and, and his efforts to recruit her.

To run for this Senate race. If the DSCC gets involved and puts its thumb on the scale, I think people are, especially people who are very active and politics are very attuned to that.

And it may not go very well for Governor Mills if there’s a sense that she’s getting too much help from outside groups or the DSCC or the Democratic senatorial campaign committee. I think … it’s a very difficult balancing act that she has. Even this week she was asked about the shutdown and whether or not Democrat, whether or not she would go along with Senator Schumer’s strategy on the shutdown and attaching these affordable Care Act subsidies.

And she just said basically not necessarily, but she supports the subsidies and she supports Democrats’ position in the shutdown and she blames the Republicans for the shutdown. So it was just this disconnect between she just, I think she just was trying to steer clear of any sort of affinity for Senator Schumer.

You know what I mean? And I think that’s very illustrative of the dynamic that’s at play here. And Ron mentioned this too, that this is really if Senate Democrats want to retake the majority, the map is not terribly favor favorable to them. But if there is a path, it does run through this state, which is one of the reasons why I think you’re seeing so much attention on this race. Because it’s really a microcosm of a larger dynamic playing out in the Democratic party all over the country.

CHAKRABARTI: Professor Schmidt, though, I was thinking, I think it was in the last election where there was that similar dynamic that’s happening in Maine now. This this dichotomy between the fresh face versus the establishment Democrat. And in most of those races, if memory serves, the establishment or the more quote-unquote centrist Democrat won.

So I mean this battle doesn’t have a great track record except in a couple of places for the more sort of progressive wing of the Democratic party.

SCHMIDT: But then look at who Platner has been working with since he agreed to run for the office. He’s working with people who’ve worked with Zohran Mamdani Momani and John Fetterman.

And of course he’s won the endorsement of Bernie Sanders. So he’s looking to be part of that smaller group of winning. He would reject the term, but I’d say still part of the progressive wing of the Democratic party.

CHAKRABARTI: Yeah. Steve, actually, on that note, and I think you said this earlier, but I did not retain it in my Friday brain and I’m sorry, but thinking about Collins’ last win in 2020.

Very expensive race, as we talked about. And the polling didn’t seem to be in her favor. What were the missteps of the Gideon campaign that maybe the current Democrats need to learn from?

MISTLER: I think, honestly, if you were to, I’ve been asking this question of a lot of people lately, and what was the message?

Of the Gideon campaign, and I honestly don’t recall outside of trying to basically align Senator Collins with President Trump. And I just don’t think that in and of itself is the only thing you need to do. And again, I think Senator Collins won that race by not nationalizing the race.

And talking more about what she does for the state and what she could do with her ascension to appropriations chairperson, which of course she is that now, but the Democrats are trying to erode that, or trying to raise questions about that position.

Because look, the appropriations committee isn’t as influential as it once was, because the current administration is trying to rest spending control from Congress. And so Democrats are already beating that drum that, look, Senator Collins promised to deliver all this funding to the state, but she hasn’t stood up to Trump enough to prevent him from rescission packages or funding cuts or firing of federal workers or whatever it is.

They are, they do seem to be more hip to that deficiency in 2020 than they were six, five years ago. But there may be another dynamic at play here.

CHAKRABARTI: We heard that in our conversation with Governor Mills, that every time we mentioned the word Schumer, she seemed to immediately pivot to talking about her record as governor in Maine, Professor Schmidt.

Ever since what, 2016, maybe everyone’s crystal balls have cracked. But even though we’re more than 12 months from the midterms, given the energy that you’re seeing now, do you care to make any predictions or at least what — (LAUGHS)

SCHMIDT: You’ve stolen my metaphor, but I always tell people I put my crystal ball away in 2016.

CHAKRABARTI: Okay. Then, so let me ask a better question. What will you be looking for as important indicators as these campaigns really continue to gear up and spread across the state of Maine?

SCHMIDT: Steve said this already, that looking at independents who want to participate in the Democratic primary I think is something that I’ll be paying attention to and also, in terms of, as you said, how the governor has tried to lean into her accomplishments as governor rather than talking too much about the fight with Trump or about Senator Schumer, I think the sort of message of fear and opposition has worked for the Trump campaigns previously, but it doesn’t seem to be a great strategy on the Democratic side.

There’s a lot if you have Democratic values to fear in the Trump administration, but a different message seems to resonate with that side. I think the last word should go to a Maine voter who yelled at our Maine based producer: ‘Too early!’ is really what their thoughts were.

The first draft of this transcript was created by Descript, an AI transcription tool. An On Point producer then thoroughly reviewed, corrected, and reformatted the transcript before publication. The use of this AI tool creates the capacity to provide these transcripts.