Graham Platner, a Marine veteran turned oyster farmer who’s now a rising Democratic Senate candidate in Maine, as soon as known as himself a “communist,” dismissed “all” police as bastards, and mentioned rural White Americans “actually are” racist and silly, in accordance with deleted social media posts reviewed by NCS’s KFile.
Most of the posts have been made 5 years in the past below Platner’s then-Reddit handle P-Hustle. They have been deleted forward of his marketing campaign launch in August. The posts in some methods underscore Platner’s repute as an anti-establishment outsider with unapologetically left-wing views. But the labels and tone utilized in his writings may additionally show pricey in a state recognized for electing political moderates.
In an interview with NCS on Tuesday, Platner disavowed his posts, saying they got here from a time when he felt disillusioned and indignant and expressed these feelings on-line. He mentioned his criticisms of rural White Americans and the police, and his political feedback, don’t replicate who he’s and what he stands for immediately.
“That was very much me f**king around the internet,” he advised NCS. “I don’t want people to see me for who I was in my worst Internet comment – or even frankly who I was in my best Internet comment … I don’t think any of that is indicative of who I am today, really.”
He mentioned he deleted the posts just lately as a result of he not needed to be related along with his on-line feedback from a darker time in his life.
In one now-deleted Reddit remark from 2021, Platner responded to a thread about individuals turning into extra conservative as they age by saying: “I got older and became a communist.” The remark was made on a subreddit known as r/Antiwork, a far-left discussion board “for those who want to end work.”
In another Reddit post that year, Platner mirrored on his life after his army service, saying he was “a vegetable growing, psychedelics taking socialist these days. After the war, I’ve pretty much stopped believing in any of the patriotic nonsense that got me there in the first place, and am a firm believer that the best thing a person can do is help their neighbors and live a loving life.”
“Still got the guns though,” he added. “I don’t trust the fascists to act politely.”
In his interview with NCS, Platner needed to guarantee voters: “I’m not a communist. I’m not a socialist. I own a small business. I’m a Marine Corps veteran.”
Platner, 41, entered the race in August to problem Republican Sen. Susan Collins, saying he’s “not fooled by this fake charade of Collins’ deliberations and moderation” and that he’s working “to fight for working people” and “topple the oligarchy that’s destroying our country.”
The major discipline for the Democratic nomination contains Janet Mills, the state’s widespread 77-year-old governor, who introduced this week she was in search of the nomination. She could be the oldest particular person ever elected as a first-term US senator.
A former Marine infantryman who later served as an Army National Guard soldier and non-public safety contractor, Platner has rapidly emerged as a fundraising drive within the Maine Senate race, bringing in additional than $4 million within the weeks after asserting his candidacy, according to filings and marketing campaign statements.
His momentum has been fueled partly by a high-profile endorsement from Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, who appeared with Platner at a Labor Day rally in Portland. He’s attracted nationwide consideration from progressive organizations, on-line left-wing influencers and grassroots Democrats extremely supportive of his outspoken financial populism.
On his Reddit, Platner didn’t establish himself by title, however he shared biographical particulars, together with his army service, age, occupation and residence in Maine. While the account dated again to 2009, a lot of his most incendiary feedback reviewed by NCS have been posted round 2021.
Some of his harshest rhetoric was directed at legislation enforcement in threads about police shootings and the nationwide protests that adopted the 2020 homicide of George Floyd. Platner expressed frustration with what he described as systemic corruption and abuse of energy in American policing.
In one deleted remark, in a thread about a Black military lieutenant who was held at gunpoint and pepper-sprayed by police throughout a visitors cease, one Reddit person wrote, “Bastards. Cops are bastards.” Platner replied, “All of them, in fact.”
Platner additionally ceaselessly weighed in on police violence, arguing that misconduct was “a problem that extends deep into the profession as a whole” and rejecting claims of unintentional shootings after incidents such because the killing of Minneapolis Black man Daunte Wright, writing, “F**k these cops.”
“I can honestly say that that is me just being an a**hole on the Internet,” Platner advised NCS this week. “I have an immense amount of friends who are police officers. They’re not all bastards because they’re literally buddies of mine.”
In one other since-removed submit from 2020, Platner responded to a thread titled “White people aren’t as racist or stupid as Trump thinks” by writing, “Living in white rural America, I’m afraid to tell you they actually are.”
When requested concerning the remark, Platner mentioned he didn’t recall the particular change, however steered it mirrored an argument he was having on-line on the time.
“I’m also a White guy and I don’t think I’m a racist,” he mentioned. “I don’t believe that. I’m sure I was just angry on the Internet about the state of things back then.”
In one Reddit submit in 2021 about Maine’s vote to dam a power-transmission challenge between the US and Canada, Platner responded sharply to a commenter from Canada questioning the consequence.
“I have to ask, and I do mean this is the most charitable of ways, but are you retarded?” Platner wrote. “We shouldn’t have the eat the pain because you c*nts and Massachusetts couldn’t act like adults. F**k off and die, leave Maine out of your capitalist fantasies.”
The challenge had been a political flashpoint in Maine, the place almost 60 p.c of voters opposed it in a 2021 referendum, with critics arguing it could minimize by undeveloped forestland, provide little profit to Maine residents and primarily serve to transmit electrical energy from Canada to Massachusetts.
Platner repeatedly used the phrase “retarded” to insult different Reddit customers, together with in a single deleted remark that started, “I don’t want to be excessively insulting here … but are you retarded?”
In different feedback, Platner voiced frustration over his army service in Iraq and Afghanistan. He spoke candidly about how his fight expertise reshaped his politics. Writing in 2021 on the subreddit r/SocialistRA — a self-described “anti-capitalist left” firearms-education discussion board that claims it’s unaffiliated with the Socialist Rifle Association — he wrote that his years in uniform had left him disillusioned with America’s wars and the nation itself.
“My time in America’s imperial wars definitely radicalized me further, and I’m significantly more left today than I was back then. It is difficult to see all that horror, as well as all the grift and corruption, and not find the entire thing utterly bankrupt,” Platner wrote. “I did used to love America, or at least the idea of it. These days I’m pretty disgusted by it all.”
“It becomes increasingly clear the wars were a waste of our time and dead friends/violence we committed was all for naught,” he added.
Platner advised NCS he not feels the identical disillusionment with America he as soon as expressed on-line, although he stays “very angry still about the wars I had to fight in and what I had to take part in.”
But that doesn’t imply he’s not patriotic, he mentioned.
“I absolutely love the place that I live and I love the people around me,” Platner advised NCS. “And I do actually believe firmly in the idea that we as Americans have a lot in common and that we can be the thing that we want to be the thing that we claim to be,” he mentioned.
Platner mentioned he nonetheless believes a number of the concepts, if not the particular rhetoric he posted years in the past. For instance, he nonetheless condemns the conduct of January 6 rioters. On his Reddit account in 2021, he
He wrote mockingly in January 2021, “‘My coup attempt failed, so now I’m going to say I didn’t really mean it! Please be nice to me, my life is in shambles after I tried to overthrow the democratically elected government!’”
In another post in 2010, Platner took purpose at musician Ted Nugent, a conservative activist.
“As a combat veteran, that m*therf**ker makes me want to puke when he spews his warmongering macho bullshit. Suck a d*ck, Ted.”
“To be fair,” Platner advised NCS. “I’m not really regretful of that one.”