State Sen. Rick Bennett announced Tuesday that he's unenrolling from the Republican party to run for governor as an independent, an entry that could shake up the 2026 contest for the Democratic and Republican nominees next year.
Bennett, 62, is a longtime Republican who chaired the Maine GOP from 2013 through part of 2017. But he's shown signs of departing from party orthodoxy since returning to the Maine Senate in 2020.
Now Bennett is shedding the Republican label for a gubernatorial run that seeks to tap into voter disenchantment with partisan politics, which he highlighted during his campaign kickoff in South Paris.
"It is time to remake our politics, to reclaim it," he said. "We must turn away from the cynicism. The cruelty and the fear that have crept too far into our public discourse. The hateful rhetoric, the divisiveness. The constant effort to pit neighbor against neighbor. That is not who we are in Maine and is not who we should ever be as a country."
Bennett joins a field of more than a dozen candidates that's likely to grow in the coming months. His announcement speech in South Paris focused on his bipartisan work in the legislature, affordable housing and the influence of money in politics.
Bennett's candidacy could affect the 2026 election if he can draw enough support from independents and centrist Democrats and Republicans. While Maine adopted ranked-choice voting in 2016, an advisory opinion by the Maine Supreme Judicial Court that it likely violated the state constitution has kept it out of gubernatorial elections except for primary contests. A bill enacted by the legislature this year could change that, but it awaits action from Mills.
