Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Graham Platner is disavowing a series of deleted social media posts in which he criticized police and wrote that white rural Americans “actually are” racist and stupid. Platner said the posts were a result of loneliness and disillusionment after he left the military, but don't represent who he is today.
The posts, first reported by CNN, appeared on Reddit, a popular social media forum where users typically comment with a pseudonym. Several came after Platner, a military veteran, returned from Afghanistan in 2018.
"I didn't feel connected. I didn't feel like I understood my place in the world, my place in our society. And that of course resulted in a lot of feelings of alienation and loneliness. And that's when all this happened," he said.
The most provocative posts came between 2020 and 2021. In 2020, he responded to a thread titled "white people aren’t as racist or stupid as Trump thinks” by writing, “Living in white rural America, I’m afraid to tell you they actually are.”
That comment is sharply at odds with how Platner talks about those voters now. And he's repeatedly tried to frame his campaign to defeat Republican Sen. Susan Collins as one that has crossover appeal to Trump voters.
At a recent town hall in Madawaska, he defended a woman who suggested illegal immigrants are getting special benefits by saying she and other Trump voters had been misinformed and lied to.
"People are propagandized, people are misinformed but people are not stupid. And we shouldn't treat them as such," he said. "People are angry because they know they're being screwed. They might get lied to, they might get taken in. If somebody robs your neighbor's house, you don't go over there and laugh at them afterwards. They've been taken advantage of. And that's what this is."
Platner was asked to reconcile views he had four years ago and now.
"You know, I am a white guy from rural Maine. I don't think I'm a racist," he said. "I know all of my neighbors who, in eastern Maine, are all primarily white. They are not racist. I have met racist white Mainers. They exist. I've absolutely spoken to them in my life before. They are a small, small minority."
He went on to say that his comments stemmed from his anger and frustration at "everything" and that he's more empathetic and compassionate now.
His comments about police followed the racial justice protests stemming from the police murder of George Floyd. He sometimes posted about his military service and how he "stopped believing in any of the patriotic nonsense that got me there in the first place."
On the campaign trail, Platner has talked a lot about how his military service has shaped his politics. But he says he's less disillusioned now.
"I certainly today have a very different view of this stuff and how we need to be open and engaged with each other. And be willing to forgive a lot, even if we find ourselves in disagreements with folks," he said.
Nevertheless, the resurfacing of Platner's Reddit posts mark the first challenge of a campaign that had been riding a lot of momentum. Much of his emergence as a political sensation stemmed from the way he's channeled disenchantment and angst in the Democratic base.
Some high-profile Democrats asserted in social media posts that Platner's old posts should be a cause for concern. Those views come just days after Democratic Gov. Janet Mills entered the Democratic primary after she was recruited by Senate Democratic leaders.
Mills is trying to position herself as vetted and battle-tested, two qualities needed to unseat Collins next year.
When asked to comment on the CNN story during a campaign event in Freeport, Mills said she hadn't read it but that she would "strongly disagree with those comments."
