In Maine’s marquee Senate primary, Janet Mills reaches out to women by raising Graham Platner’s online past

“It’s disgusting,” says one woman in the ad. “Disqualifying,” says another.

They’re shown reacting to old social media posts from Graham Platner, the Maine Democratic Senate candidate who’s been endorsed by Sens. Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, in a new ad from his rival, Maine Gov. Janet Mills.

The now-deleted posts surfaced last fall, after CNN’s KFile and then the Washington Post reported on online commentary from Platner stretching back years. Mills’ new ad features 2013 comments from Platner downplaying incidents of sexual assault in the military by suggesting victims avoid getting drunk “around people you aren’t comfortable with.”

Hours after the ad was released, Platner addressed the media and appeared with women who support his campaign. Then his campaign launched its own TV ad directly responding to Mills’ attack.

“If I saw these ads, I’d have questions,” Platner says, appearing on camera. “So, Maine, I’m asking you not to judge me for the worst thing I said on the internet on my worst day 14 years ago, but who I am today.”

Mills and her allies are counting on a gender gap to narrow Platner’s wide lead ahead of the June 9 primary to decide who will face incumbent Republican Sen. Susan Collins. They are betting that the unfiltered style that has brought Platner widespread attention as someone who could help Democrats reach young men will backfire with women.

In 2020 — the last year with available exit poll data — the state’s electorate was 59% female. A February survey from the University of New Hampshire, which found Platner substantially ahead among voters of both genders, showed his lead is broader among men than women.

“I was really on board for him up until, you know, the controversy that happened a few months ago, is when I kind of started questioning,” said Emma Bagby, a substance abuse therapist from Scarborough, Maine. “Making the comments about women being sexually assaulted, and that they need to take responsibility for themselves in that aspect, you know, that kind of rhetoric, just is scary right now.”

Speaking to CNN’s Manu Raju, Platner said, “I’ve gone all over the state of Maine and allowed people to ask me about it all directly for months now.”

“I think, for a lot of folks in the state to see this get kind of dragged back up months and months after we’d already talked about it — I will just say the feedback we have received statewide is that people find all of this to be everything they hate about politics,” Platner said.

Platner’s campaign launch last August was greeted by a burst of Democratic enthusiasm about the oyster farmer and Marine veteran. Soon after Mills joined the race in October, reports began emerging that sparked a series of controversies. Stories about the Reddit posts were followed by the revelation that Platner had a tattoo on his chest of an image widely recognized as a Nazi symbol, which he has since had covered. Platner attributes his missteps to youthful ignorance.

“I as a person have transformed over time and changed, which actually I think a lot of folks can identify with,” he told CNN.

Sanders endorsed Platner last August, shortly after he launched his campaign, imparting his progressive, anti-establishment mantle. And in recent weeks Platner has rolled out a steady stream of other prominent endorsers, including Arizona Sen. Ruben Gallego, New Mexico Sen. Martin Heinrich and Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren.

Platner has established a fundraising lead; according to end-of-year FEC reports, he raised about $4.6 million in the fourth quarter and had amassed $3.7 million cash on hand, compared with Mills raising $2.7 million in the period and reporting $1.3 million in cash on hand.

Mills was recruited to run by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer as a more conventional candidate against Collins, widely seen as one of the toughest Republican incumbents and someone Democrats almost certainly will need to defeat to retake Senate control this fall. But Mills also faces questions about her age. At 77, she would become the oldest first-term senator in history and promised not to seek a second term if she wins.

“Electability is the key in this race,” Mills told journalist Chris Cillizza this month. “Because if we want to unseat Susan Collins, we have to put up a candidate who can win and in the past, we put up good people to run against her, but they’ve all been untested.”

Mills has also joked on social media: “For what it’s worth, I don’t have any tattoos.”

Platner’s supporters want Democrats to embrace a candidate who they think offers an answer to problems the party has faced with rural voters, young men and alternative media, which observers think contributed to their losses in 2024.

“He’s still attracting 600, 700 people like he was before, which, having been in Maine politics for nearly 25 years now, I have never seen that in any primary election,” said Toby McGrath, a veteran Maine Democratic campaign consultant. “I think Graham Platner has a lot more upside in the general election, potentially more downside. And I think that, you know, we’re in the margins when it’s the governor and the senator.”

Labor is also rallying to Platner’s campaign, which is backed by several labor unions including the United Auto Workers, the Maine State Nurses Association, and the International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers.

In late February, Michael Monahan, vice president of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers 2nd district – which covers Maine –– wrote a letter to the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee to “express our deep concern regarding the DSCC’s ongoing involvement in the 2026 Maine Democratic Senate Primary.”

“Graham Platner is the only candidate in this race who stands with working people, respects organized labor and has earned labor’s trust. We strongly urge the DSCC to refrain from intervening further in this primary,” Monahan wrote, criticizing Mills’ record on labor issues.

Megan Smith, with the Maine People’s Alliance, a progressive community action organization that has endorsed Platner, said that “I have not seen the momentum at all slowing for Graham.”

“The consensus amongst a lot of people is that we need to allow people to change and to grow and to become different people,” Smith said.

And she also cautioned national Democrats against trying to influence the outcome.

“I think people in Maine don’t like to be told what to do from outside. I also think that the Democratic Party at the national level does not have a very high approval rating, so I’m not sure how much establishment Democrats coming into Maine saying this is our candidate, is going to be helpful for either candidate,” Smith said.

Bagby, meanwhile, is still making up her mind.

“I think Janet Mills feels safe, because we know what she stands for. We know what she’s done, versus Graham Platner, he’s new, and now all these things are coming out,” she said. “So, I think it’s just gonna be kind of a game-time decision based on what he says these next couple of months.”