Maine Democratic Senate candidate Graham Platner is still claiming that he comes from a working-class background. It’s part of his effort to brand himself as an anti-corporate champion fighting for blue-collar America.
Unfortunately, the facts don’t line up with his narrative, according to Fox News:
Maine Democratic Senate candidate Graham Platner built a national reputation as an anti-corporate crusader while cashing checks written by lobbyists and executives representing those same corporations, campaign finance documents show.
Platner has made criticism of big tech, the pharmaceutical industry, large banks and defense contractors a cornerstone of his campaign to unseat incumbent GOP Sen. Susan Collins. Federal Election Commission and Lobbying Disclosure Act records reviewed by Fox News Digital show that Platner accepted more than $30,000 from lobbyists representing a range of interests and executives at major companies between August 2025 and March of this year.
The donations were made personally by lobbyists and executives, not by the corporations themselves.
"Our new ad speaks to one of the most urgent issues I hear on the campaign trail: our healthcare system is collapsing," Platner posted to X on March 24, referencing a campaign ad where he promised to take on the drug industry if elected to the Senate. "We should shut down Big Pharma, not our hospitals."
“I’m a working-class guy that lives a working-class life,” he said, according to The New York Times. He also claimed he has “never been close to money and power.”
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Yet, Platner’s actual background undercuts the image he and his campaign have crafted. The New York Times noted that he is the son of a Dartmouth College-educated lawyer and the grandson of a famed Connecticut architect. He attended the elite Hotchkiss School before graduating from a public college.
Property records show he received a $200,000 loan from his father to purchase his home, the Washington Free Beacon reported. He later started a small oyster farm and relied on his veterans' disability benefits for a significant portion of his income.
Platner has been barraged by a steady stream of revelations about his past behavior and social media comments. He came under fire for having a Nazi-aligned tattoo on his chest. He later apologized, saying he did not realize the symbol's origins.
In past social media comments, he made derogatory remarks about black people, women, and members of the LGBTQ community. In a bizarre post, he talked about pleasuring himself in Porta-Potties. He later claimed the comments were made in jest.
But one of the more serious revelations concerned his conduct as a married man. A Wall Street Journal report revealed that his wife told his campaign during the vetting process that he had sent sexually inappropriate messages to as many as a dozen other women through a messaging app. She said he had stopped the behavior before starting his campaign.
“We did the hard work that marriage requires. We went to counseling. We were honest with each other in ways that weren’t easy,” Platner’s wife said in a video commenting on the matter. “And we came through it, not in spite of how much we’ve been through, but because of how much we love each other and the life we’ve built. Our marriage today is stronger than ever before.”
Still, despite his background, Democrats are still propping him up as a populist figure working to benefit the working class. A University of New Hampshire Survey Center poll released in late May showed he was leading incumbent Republican Sen. Susan Collins 49 to 45 percent.
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