How Much Longer Can Graham Platner's Senate Campaign Survive?

Graham Platner has now been the presumptive Democratic nominee for Maine’s Senate seat for a few weeks, and I’m starting to wonder how much longer it will last.

A trove of since-deleted Reddit posts tied to Platner’s burner account under the handle “P-Hustle,” which was active in military forums including r/Military and r/USMC, has been revealed. What they contain won’t be making it into any Platner campaign mailers.

In a March 2017 thread on r/Military asking veterans about familiar smells that trigger nostalgia, Platner went in a decidedly different direction than most. “I still have to jerk off every time I sit in a portashi**er….that blue water smell conditioned me,” he wrote. When Fox News asked about it, Platner insisted he was joking. “You should read the comments in context,” he said. “It’s very clear I’m joking.”

Sure. Crystal clear.

Then there’s a March 2021 thread in r/USMC titled “GWOT D*** Art,” featuring photos of crude graffiti drawn by troops during the Global War on Terror. Platner didn’t scroll past. He stopped, recognized a piece of artwork, and delivered what can only be described as an enthusiastic art critique. “Oh sh**!!! You’ve got the Hot Rod C— from Manas!” he wrote, before launching into an elaborate description of the graffiti. He called it “‘the most beautiful sight these cynical old infantry eyes have ever seen.” He said witnessing it filled his soul with joy.

Manas, for those keeping score, was the American military transit hub in Kyrgyzstan used during the Afghanistan campaign. Platner served in the Marine Corps from 2003 to 2007, with deployments to both Iraq and Afghanistan.

Platner’s explanation for all of this was, to say the least, unconvincing. He told Fox News the behavior was “s—posting” — his word. “It’s when you argue with people on the internet and try to bother them,” he explained. “So, yeah, no, it’s very obviously not true.”

The problem is that it doesn’t hold up.

It was also revealed that, in another Reddit post, Platner mocked Purple Heart recipient Pfc. Ted Daniels, a soldier who was wounded after taking incoming fire during a 2012 battle with the Taliban.

“At least his stupidity and fat ass wheezing are available for all future infantrymen to witness and hold in contempt. Poor marksmanship on the Taliban’s part is the only reason this mouthbreather made it home, he managed to make every possible s*** decision possible when it comes to small unit combat.”

Even by today’s degraded political standards, attacking a combat-wounded veteran is the kind of thing that used to end a public career on the spot. And we’re supposed to believe it was just innocent trolling, and he didn’t mean it?

The problem is that his internet paper trail is so extensive and full of troubling comments. Previous reporting revealed other Reddit posts in which he described himself as a “communist,” called rural white Americans “actually” racist and stupid, and attacked all police officers as “bastards.” He also once defended Marines urinating on dead Taliban fighters and described war as “the most enjoyable experience,” which is an odd posture for someone who brands himself as an anti-war candidate.

And then there’s the tattoo. A prominent chest tattoo of the Totenkopf — the Nazi SS “death’s head” symbol. Platner says he got it drunk in Croatia in 2007 and didn’t realize its Nazi associations, even though he reportedly bragged about it for years.

There aren’t enough fresh polls yet to measure just how much damage the latest revelations have done, but the prediction markets are noticing. Democratic odds of winning the Maine Senate race have slipped from 79% on Monday to 73% on Wednesday. While this is not a catastrophic collapse yet, the problem for Platner is that more damaging information on him is coming.

Political analyst Mark Halperin reported earlier this month on 2WAY’s “The Morning Meeting.” According to an NRSC source, the opposition research they haven’t even deployed yet is so damaging that it won’t just cost Platner the election. “I saw one of the spokespeople say he’ll have to leave the state,” Halperin said. “He won’t just lose the race, he’ll have to leave Maine.”

But if what’s surfaced so far is only the opening salvo, it’s genuinely hard to see how his campaign survives the full barrage.