‘Today We Move Forward’: Troy Jackson Tries To Wipe The Dem Slate Clean as Maine Senate Candidate

Former Maine state Senate President Troy Jackson (D) has officially replaced Graham Platner as the Democratic nominee to run against Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) in November.

Maine Democrats picked Jackson as their U.S. Senate nominee during a state convention Saturday morning.

Platner ended his scandal-plagued campaign earlier this month after a sexual assault allegation served as the final straw for his campaign. Platner has denied the allegation.

MS NOW’s Chris Jansing reported from Maine on Jackson’s speech:

I think he said it best, first of all, in his speech, which is, “Today, we move forward.” And I can tell you, after the whole debacle with Graham Platner, that could not come soon enough for Democrats in this state, but they feel like they came out of that convention united.

He overwhelmingly won the nomination. Now the hard part begins, right? Somebody who has won time and time and time again, Susan Collins — and I can tell you from talking with Republicans, they are feeling very, very confident — but Democrats think that this is a different playing field than she’s ever had to be on before.

Jansing played tape of Jackson saying of Collins, “For nearly 30 years, Collins has told Maine that she is ‘concerned.’ She was concerned while she rubber-stamped Trump’s Medicaid cuts and gutted our health care. She’s concerned when she cut taxes for corporations and the wealthy, concerned when she confirmed justices who overturned Roe V. Wade. And really tragically, she was concerned when she gave ICE billions to terrorize our neighbors.”

“I can’t tell you the number of people who I’ve talked to over the last couple of days who say they’re tired of her concern,” Jansing said. “So that talking point is resonating. They have to turn that into action, right?”

Jansing added, “This campaign believes in the power of the grassroots, and so they’re working to organize that. Remember, they’ve only been in this for about three and a half weeks, and they only have 101 days to get this all together. But maybe the even larger concern is the money. He’s starting at a huge deficit. His campaign says he raised about $1 million in the days after it became clear he was going to be the nominee. She’s got at least $11 million in the bank, but it is the outside money that’s coming in, including millions of dollars from at least 97 billionaires and their spouses.”

Watch the clip above via MS NOW.

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