Former Ronald Reagan White House staffer and U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Robert (Bobby) Charles will be the Republican nominee for Maine’s gubernatorial election this fall, facing off against Democrat Hannah Pingree. Charles is also notably a frequent contributor to AMAC Newsline and has served as a national spokesman for the organization.
Charles emerged from a crowded field of eight GOP candidates. Because Maine uses ranked-choice voting for its primary elections, a candidate must win at least 50 percent of first-place votes to win the race outright. Although Charles was the top vote-getter on the first ballot with 37.9 percent, it took several rounds of vote tabulation before he ultimately prevailed 60.3 percent to 39.7 percent.
Charles’s campaign platform includes an effort to “eliminate so-called ‘woke’ indoctrination from classrooms,” “abolish the state income tax,” and “strengthen law enforcement.” In his platform, Charles explains, “On Day One I will drop the Title IX lawsuit wasting your money to keep boys in girls’ sports, pass the Academic Excellence Act to tie all education funding to literacy, math, and science, and restore full parental transparency into what’s being taught.”
After securing the Republican nomination, Charles said that his candidacy is about bringing change to Maine.
“Maine, the results are in and they confirm what we already knew,” he said. “You, me, us, we are ready for change. We are in need of change. But, before we look forward, I want to say just something short here about this process because it also revealed something very troubling, and as governor, I will fix it. Maine voters deserve to know the results of the elections on the day that they cast their vote, by election night.”
The ranked-choice primary originally took place on June 9. It took ten days for the votes to be tabulated to determine the Republican nominee. Charles won with approximately 60,000 votes.
Independent candidate Rick Bennett also qualified to be on the general election ballot this November. Bennett is a member of the Maine Senate and formerly served as the Maine GOP chair. He left the Republican Party last year before deciding to make an independent bid for governor.
With a third-party candidate potentially splitting the Republican vote, most pollsters currently have the race leaning or tilting in favor of the Democrats. Inside Elections currently has the race as “Likely Democratic.” RealClearPolitics has the race as “Leans Dem.”
But Republicans nonetheless have reason for optimism following eight years of Democrat rule under Governor Janet Mills, who notably lost to socialist Graham Platner in the Democrat U.S. Senate primary in the state earlier this year. Emerson College released a poll in March showing that 54 percent of likely voters in the state had an unfavorable opinion of Mills.
Mills has defiantly allowed males who claim to be transgender to continue participating in women’s sports in schools, even after President Donald Trump signed an executive order prohibiting it. In polling from last year, nearly two-thirds of Maine adults said they opposed allowing men in women’s sports. Charles thus has at least one issue where a solid majority of voters are on his side, and Pingree will have to answer for her party’s unpopular position.
Platner could also act as an electoral anchor for Democrats statewide in Maine. As AMAC Newsline has previously reported, Platner is mired in a growing number of scandals related to his past personal behavior and disturbing, often violent comments made online.
While Maine has tilted Democrat in recent years, it also has a history of electing Republicans if the conditions are right. Senator Susan Collins has been a notable GOP survivor since she was first elected in 1996. Former Governor Paul LePage also won two terms there as a Republican in 2010 and 2014.
Alan Jamison is the pen name of a political writer with extensive experience writing for several notable politicians and news outlets.
