Graham Platner, a 40-year-old Army and Marine veteran who served four combat tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, launched his campaign for the Senate in Maine on Tuesday, joining a growing Democratic primary field seeking to take on Republican Sen. Susan Collins.
Platner, an oyster farmer who was born and raised in Sullivan, Maine, will run on a platform of universal health care, housing affordability and ending U.S. involvement in foreign wars.
“I feel an obligation to protect this place and protect the people in it,” Platner said in an interview.
Platner joins a growing Democratic primary field that features Jordan Wood, a former chief of staff to former Rep. Katie Porter, D-Calif., and David Costello, who challenged independent Sen. Angus King last year.
Democratic Gov. Janet Mills has said she is considering getting into the contest, while Rep. Jared Golden, D-Maine, has opted against joining the budding primary in what, on paper, might look like Democrats’ best opportunity to flip a Senate seat in 2026. Collins is the only Republican senator who represents a state Kamala Harris carried in the last presidential election.
But she has proven a tough opponent in blue Maine. In her last campaign, in 2020, she beat Democratic opponent Sarah Gideon by more than 8 percentage points, even as Donald Trump lost Maine by more than 9 points.
Republicans have a 53-47 majority in the Senate, meaning Democrats would need to flip four seats in the 2026 midterms to take the majority.
Platner said his experience in the military helped shape his political perspective as he prepared his campaign.
“When I joined the Marine Corps, I joined up because I really, truly believed in the American project,” he said. “I wanted to fight for something I loved and that I thought was good in Iraq and Afghanistan. I watched both failed policies, failed strategies, failed tactics being used over and over and over again.”
“There’s a point where you have to start asking yourself what is the point of this,” he added. “Why are you doing this? And when I went back as a security contractor in 2018, what I began to realize is that I was just watching vast amounts of taxpayer money getting put into the pockets of defense contractors, of security contractors, of this whole apparatus that almost seemed to exist merely to take taxpayer money and put it into somebody’s private bank account. And in seeing that up close for a while, it turned me into a deeply, deeply cynical and angry guy. From that I began to kind of look at our larger political system, our larger economic system, and you just begin to see the same exact thing.”
Platner is seeking to connect with working-class voters who’ve migrated toward the GOP in recent cycles. He pointed to Golden, Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., as figures offering hope for the Democratic Party nationally and in his state.
“If we focus primarily on fighting for working-class values, fighting for policies that help working-class people, clawing back a lot of the power that has been consolidated in the kind of higher establishment-class politics, I think if you stick to that stuff, you can win,” Platner said. “And getting dragged into many of these minor culture war fights is not remotely the answer.”
“I don’t just identify with the more of the left parts of the party. People like Jared Golden are doing an excellent job. That’s why he’s been able to hold on to a Democratic seat in a Trump district,” Platner said.
In a statement responding to Platner's launch, Jason Savage, executive director of the Maine GOP, excoriated Platner for appealing to Democrats' left flank.
“Being a Bernie Bro and Kamala Harris donor is a profile to appeal to Portland progressives, not centrist and conservative voters in rural Maine," Savage said.
The National Republican Senatorial Committee said in its own statement that Collins was unfazed by Platner's campaign.
"While Maine Democrats have to duke it out in an increasingly crowded and messy primary, Susan Collins is singularly focused on delivering for Mainers and fighting for common-sense policies that improve the lives of workers and families," said Joanna Rodriguez, an NRSC spokesperson.
In his launch video, Platner excoriated “billionaires and corrupt politicians profiting off and destroying our environment, driving our families into poverty and crushing the middle class,” saying his military experience made him unafraid to “name an enemy, and the enemy is the oligarchy.”
“I’m not fooled by this fake charade of Collins’ deliberations and moderation,” he said. “The difference between Susan Collins and Ted Cruz is at least Ted Cruz is honest about selling us out and not giving a damn."
