By Philip Klein
Thursday, April 30, 2026
Governor Janet Mills on Thursday announced that she was dropping out of the Maine Senate race, with polls showing
her way behind Graham Platner, who is now presumed to be the Democrat who will
go up against Senator Susan Collins in one of the most hotly contested races of
the year.
Platner was largely unknown at this point last year and
yet managed to drive a sitting governor out of the primary before a single vote
was cast. But he had one thing going for him, which is that he gained attention
for his antisemitism. That is a ticket to success in the modern Democratic
Party.
Platner had a tattoo with a Nazi symbol on his chest for
nearly 20 years before covering it up when called out for it during his Senate
campaign. On another occasion, he promoted a social media post from the
neo-Nazi Holocaust denier Stew Peters, and he also sat for a lengthy interview with antisemitic conspiracy theorist Nate
Cornacchia, claiming he was a longtime fan. He has also described the
U.S.-Israel relationship as “shameful”
and praised a violent Hamas attack on Israel in 2014.
Any of this would have once been a political death
sentence, but just as Zohran Mamdani proved in New York City, engaging in
antisemitism and unhinged hatred of Israel has become a way for upstart
candidates to soar to the top of the Democratic Party by convincing the
progressive base that they are the real deal. It isn’t just a matter of the
contempt the base holds for Jews and Israel, but also the idea that if somebody
is willing to hold firm on this issue, they are more likely to hold firm on
economic issues and other issues of importance.
Now we’ll have to listen for months to arguments that it
is our moral duty to support the Nazi tattoo guy over the threat posed by
centrist Republican Senator Susan Collins, because Trump.
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