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Notes -
What are the Democrats’ carrots & sticks for pushing Graham Platner out of the campaign?
If you follow U.S. domestic politics (or if you’ve just read the thread below), then you’ll know who Graham Platner is. He’s the young-ish politician who won the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate from Maine, in the process attracting attention for combining liberal political positions with some elements of a blue collar background. In my view, he received a tremendous amount of scrutiny for being at the intersection of 3 significant stories: (1) the Democrats’ struggles to attract rural male voters; (2) the importance of Maine as a toss-up Senate seat in 2028 for deciding the balance of the U.S. senate; and (3) the adoption of certain leftist political positions by new politicians (broadly economic populism and antagonism towards Israel) that are seen as breaking from norms and potentially as a marker of future political currents.
More recently, Platner has also attracted attention for a series of scandals. First, some of his early, intended-to-be-anonymous internet postings were identified, and they were both unseemly and promoted ideas in conflict with his current public political positions. Then, it was revealed that he had a Nazi-symbol tattoo from his time in the military (Platner denies knowing that the tattoo was Nazi imagery when he got it; some people find this explanation believable and others don’t). Then, it was revealed that he’d recently pursued extra-marital relationships through some kind of seedy dating app. Then, some of his ex-girlfriends came together alleging that Platner was volatile and had been trouble towards them in various ways.
Through all this, the Democratic establishment had mostly defended Platner. Then, a few days ago, one of Platner’s exes came forward alleging treatment by Platner that would seem to satisfy the legal standard for rape (some disagree that the alleged conduct would constitute rape - see the discussion below for details).
Anyway, I’m not really interested in re-litigating any of these items. But what really fascinates me is that the Democratic establishment now seems to have arrived at a consensus that Platner’s campaign needs to end so that another candidate might be selected (Platner has essentially lost all prominent public-backing over the last 48 hours). But ultimately, it seems that procedure requires that Platner himself formally resign his campaign in for this to happen. My question is, how can Platner be influenced to abandon his campaign?
Normally, you influence with carrots (rewards for good behavior) and sticks (punishments for bad behavior). Democrats can appeal to Platner’s sense of dignity (such as it is), patriotism, and desire for the common good. But what other levers do they hold?
I doubt that Democrats would just concede Maine if Platner were to remain in the race. If he drops out now, he’ll always be remembered for this last week. But if he stays in the race, then I assume he'll benefit from 4 months of Democrats campaigning for him, seeking to rehabilitate his image. Even if he ends up losing the Senate race badly, that seems like a better outcome for Platner individually than the alternative of dropping out now.
What am I missing here?
I'd just add that Platner was seen as a left factional candidate from the get-go. He was recruited by a set of campaign consultants who worked for Sanders and then Fetterman. The Democratic Establishment candidate was Janet Mills, the 78 year old Governor with a 51% approval rating. The insider take I've read is that most of the young up and coming Dems in Maine wanted to duck Susan Collins and opted for lateral or incremental career moves (Hannah Pingee going for governor) so as to stay on track rather than running in the primary.
If you follow left vs center left online debates every new indication of Platner's poor judgement that leaked was declared an establishment ratfuck and when he overcame them to win the primary this was celebrated as the end of "HR lady" politics by Matt Stoller (iirc, not totally sure it was him). Today Ryan Grim was still fighting about how dishonest the media was for omitting that Platner's accusers sent a message that she needed a glute massage before telling him not to come over.
The establishment never wanted Platner, once he won the primary they were stuck defending him because they don't want to hurt his chances of beating Collins. With the assault allegation they're convinced he's going to lose no matter what so then they have to do everything they can to force him out. If we're being conspiratorial though why leak this stuff after the primary, but before the deadline for changing the ballot line. If the establishment had the allegations in their back pocket ready to leak to the medi they could have dropped it earlier and gotten Janet Mills vs. Susan Collins like they wanted.
The post-mortem on this is going to be interesting if it ever becomes publicly available, the number of people I've seen on the left and the right in the establishment who note that everyone knew about this stuff (including the NYT) is unreal.
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