You'd think a party with as much experience at trashing its own primaries to have elites pick its nominees would do better at checking the relevant statutes. At least Kamala Harris qualified for the 2024 ballot. Legally, anyway.
As expected, the 600 functionaries selected by the Democrat Party in Maine chose Troy Jackson as its anointed replacement for Graham Platner, who won the primary with 70% of the vote a month earlier. The convention on Friday came three days ahead of the deadline for the party to replace Herr Totenkopf, whose withdrawal three weeks ago set the stage for the ad hoc nominating convention.
Observers widely expected Jackson, a former president of the state senate and a candidate in this year's gubernatorial primary, to win the anointment. However, the question arose before the vote whether Jackson could run for the office. Republican state representative James White sent a letter to Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows objecting to Jackson's candidacy, which White argues violates Maine's "sore loser" election laws:
Maine has a "sore loser" law that says a candidate that runs for one office and loses cannot run for another office in the same cycle. After Graham Platner dropped out, Maine Dems are poised to nominate Troy Jackson. But Jackson ran for Governor (and lost the primary). Eligible? https://t.co/UhhWoQwjEN
— Eric W. (@EWess92) July 25, 2026
Maine Wire picked up the story this weekend, while reporting on the ambiguities in the statutes:
He points specifically to Title 21-A, Section 331, which provides that “a person may not file, whether by primary election or nomination petition, as a candidate for more than one federal, state or county office at any election.”
White also cites Section 351, which contains similar restrictions, and Section 363, which provides that a political committee filling a vacancy “shall choose a qualified person to fill the vacancy.”
Jackson sought the Democratic nomination for governor earlier this year, appeared on the June primary ballot, and was defeated by Democratic voters. White argues that Jackson’s subsequent effort to become the Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate through the party’s vacancy process raises significant legal questions over whether he remains a “qualified person” under Maine law.
However, that may be enough of an opening for Bellows and state courts to give Jackson a pass:
Unlike several states, Maine does not have an explicit “sore loser” statute that expressly bars a candidate defeated in a primary from later appearing on the general election ballot for another office. Instead, White argues that existing provisions of Title 21-A, when read together, effectively create that prohibition.
Maine law also provides political parties with a process to replace nominees who withdraw after winning a primary, but the statutes do not specifically address whether someone who lost a different statewide primary may be selected as the replacement nominee. That ambiguity has become the focus of White’s request.
Technically, Jackson should have been ineligible. So should Bellows herself, who lost in the June 9 gubernatorial primary, pushed out in the third round of ranked-choice voting. Jackson survived to the fourth round, but wound up third to nominee Hannah Pingree and runner-up Nirav Shah, who also expressed some interest in replacing Der Oysterführer on the November ballot. The 600 elites who gathered for this extraordinary demolition of their own primary results apparently never stopped to consider whether these candidates even qualified for the nomination.
However, as we saw in the Robert Torricelli switcheroo, any ambiguity in these statutes will provide the excuse needed for Bellows and state courts to refuse to enforce those standards. That's especially true given today's deadline for ballot changes in the general election. Enforcing these statutes properly, as White demands in his challenge to Bellows, would leave the Democrats without a challenger to incumbent Republican Susan Collins. Even if the statutes had no ambiguity, the courts would moan about robbing the voters of a choice in the general election, even though Maine Democrats actually robbed those same voters of their choice by pushing Platner out in the first place.
That doesn't mean Republicans shouldn't push this issue into the courts. They definitely should pursue this claim, but just don't expect the courts to do their jobs. The Torricelli Switch logic will manifest itself all over again, but that's useful in displaying the corrupt nature of this process.
Meanwhile, the Maine Wire has a handy guide ready to follow the oppo-research bombs about to drop on Jackson and Maine Democrats:
Augusta resident Troy Jackson, the former Senate President from Allagash, has secured the Maine Democratic Party’s inside nod to take over the U.S. Senate nomination, a seat vacated by his disgraced communist-socialist bestie, Graham Platner.
The national media are now racing to figure out who Jackson is and whether he’ll offer a similar bonanza for political reporters. So what’s in store for readers of the New York and DC press when they get the pleasure of learning about Action Jackson?
Let’s take a stroll through the Book of Troy.
Bookmark this for later reference, but one of these has already emerged in the gubernatorial primary and the Waiting for Grahamo period after the rape allegation emerged. Jackson has been embroiled in a legal fight over residency claims related to his earlier public office, one that involves potential fraud in an FHA loan:
In 2019, Jackson bought a home in Augusta — more than 200 miles from his district in Allagash. He financed the purchase with an FHA loan, the federal program built for low-income, first-time buyers that comes with a lower interest rate. FHA loans come with an occupancy requirement: borrowers must make the home their primary residence for at least one year. Jackson initialed that page.
Then he told the Maine State Ethics Commission a different story so he could be Senate President. From 2019 to 2021, while Jackson was bound by the occupancy clause in his mortgage, he swore in multiple campaign filings that he lived in Allagash. Those two residency claims cannot both be true.
Under federal law, signing a mortgage document you never intend to honor or violating the agreement amounts to mortgage fraud. On the other hand, if Jackson did fulfill his obligations under the loan agreement, then he would have been ineligible under Maine’s state constitution to hold the Allagash seat. A real Aroostook catch-22.
Democrats may come to regret this anointing, just like the anointing their national party conducted almost exactly two years ago.
Editor’s Note: The 2026 Midterms will determine the fate of President Trump’s America First agenda. Republicans must maintain control of both chambers of Congress.
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