Maine Democrats Officially Select Troy Jackson To Replace Graham Platner

BANGOR, Maine — Troy Jackson has officially secured the Democratic nomination to replace Graham Platner — and now has 101 days to win a race that could determine whether Democrats control the Senate.

The Maine Democratic Party convened Saturday morning and voted to make Jackson, a progressive fifth-generation logger and former state Senate president, their nominee.The party has its eyes set on what’s been a white whale for Democrats: knocking out five-term incumbent Republican Sen. Susan Collins. Jackson has been hitting Collins since he entered the race following former Senate nominee Graham Platner’s exit from the race less than three weeks ago.

The vote was a pro forma coronation: All but one of his rivals had already dropped out of the race, after he out-organized last weekend’s county caucuses, sweeping more than 90 percent of the 500 open slots. Those delegates and another 101 Democratic state committee were eligible to vote Saturday; Jackson won 566 to 5 for another candidate.

It will be a tough battle. Platner’s rapid fall — after a person who dated Platner told POLITICO he sexually assaulted her (an allegation he denies) — leaves Jackson with very little time to build the type of campaign required to beat Collins, who has made herself very well-known to voters during her three decades in office.

But where Platner was frequently trying to make grand statements about reshaping the Democratic Party, Jackson has been laser-focused on Collins since his launch.

“For nearly 30 years, Susan Collins has told Maine that she’s concerned,” Jackson said in a short speech pitching himself to the delegates. “But concern does not lower the cost of groceries and gas.”

“Maine does not need six more years of concern,” he continued.

Collins has amassed $11 million in her campaign account, and there’s another $8.2 million in a super PAC supporting her.

Jackson, meanwhile, is not known to be a particularly strong fundraiser. He’s so far raised about $1 million dollars — roughly the same figure he raised in his entire failed gubernatorial run earlier this year.

Jackson’s official selection on Saturday here at the Cross Insurance Center, featuring a 31-foot statue of Paul Bunyan, ends a tumultuous and rapid-paced process to replace Platner — one that Democrats were welcome to see concluded.

"I officially call this convention to order," Maine Democratic Party chair Charles Dingman said Saturday. “With a sigh of relief.”

The mood in the room was energetic, littered with “no more concerns” signs and Jackson baseball cards. Democrats were ready to move on from the tumultuous process that has rocked the state, and were relieved that the convention process, which had begun with a dozen candidates, didn’t get as messy as many had initially suspected it would.

“This is pretty anticlimactic," said state Rep. Wayne Farrin, one of the delegates, pointing to Jackson’s ability to essentially lock up the nomination last weekend.

Jackson isn’t the galvanizing public speaker Platner is, but he has electoral experience. Jackson represented a deep-red rural state Senate seat near the Canadian border — one that immediately flipped to the GOP when he was term-limited in 2024 — even while he pushed progressive populism that led him to work for both of Sen. Bernie Sanders’ (I-Vt.) unsuccessful presidential bids.

Jackson has also worked to distance himself from Platner the person while still connecting with the base he so successfully attracted in June’s Democratic primary.

“The hope that you built never belonged to any one campaign,” Jackson said in what was a clear call out to Platner’s base.

But that isn’t stopping Republicans from immediately resurfacing clips of him and Platner on the campaign trail earlier this year, something a number of high-ranking Republican operatives told POLITICO in recent days would be a figure of their attack plans. They will also try and paint Jackson as an establishment figure, given his long track record in Augusta.

Senate Leadership Fund, the top GOP Senate super PAC, immediately put out a six-figure ad buy with photos of Platner and Jackson campaigning together while highlighting reports on Jackson’s temper, and tying Jackson to his “decades as a political insider.”

Jackson’s supporters know the attacks are coming — but they are hopeful he can weather them.

“The political machine is just going to come for him so hard, and that sucks,” said Margaret Sinclair, a Jackson-aligned delegate from Cumberland County. “But he can handle it. His tenure speaks for itself.”