Maine Democratic Senate candidate Graham Platner joins Morning Joe

[0:00] And Graham Plattner joins us now. [0:02] It's good to have you back on the show. [0:04] Congratulations on your big win. [0:06] Graham, congratulations on your big win. [0:08] And now the tough part starts. [0:11] Obviously, you have seen sort of this crescendo. [0:15] You've seen the New York Times story. [0:17] You've seen the accusations about the sexting, about the tattoos, about... [0:22] Yesterday, it was about some NDA that somebody said that you, your team... [0:28] And we'll get to all of that. [0:29] You know how I know we'll get to all that? [0:31] We'll get to all that because Mika's here. [0:32] So she will make sure we get to all that. [0:35] I want to ask you first, though, a couple quick things. [0:40] We've been talking about Iran, obviously, for the first 30 minutes of this show. [0:44] The president should not have gone in, in our opinion, but he's in there. [0:48] How do we get out in a way that working-class voters won't be hammered every time they go to the gas station to fill up their trucks or cars? [0:58] I mean, I think the real answer here is we simply have to stop engaging in military operations against Iran. [1:08] And in the long term, I'll be entirely honest, I think we need to start pulling troops back from the region entirely. [1:14] I mean, my entire life has been essentially defined by America's wars in the Middle East. [1:23] And here we are, almost 30 years, well, really, if you look back at the Gulf War, even longer. [1:30] And what has it really brought us? [1:32] I mean, we just get a mass amount of debt, spending a ton of taxpayer money, [1:38] expending the lives and, frankly, the futures of a whole generation of young American men and women, [1:46] and bringing an immense amount of violence to civilians in the region. [1:51] I think long term, I mean, I've never, no one's ever been able to explain to me what, like, fighting in Iraq did for the state of Maine. [1:59] And I think the reason it was being able to explain that to me is that it didn't do anything, or at least nothing positive. [2:04] And so I do think long term, we really need to be thinking about rearranging how we think about projecting power around the world and in the region. [2:12] But right now, I mean, the longer we engage, the longer we give, you guys were talking about it earlier, [2:17] we give the Iranians the ability to control the tempo. [2:21] We have no control over the tempo. [2:23] We have no control over the outcome. [2:25] And, yeah. [2:28] I'm sorry, we have a delay. [2:29] I was just going to say the difference for Mainers on Iraq and Iran is what's happening in Iran is actually impacting working Mainers even more than the tragedy of Iraq because of the strait. [2:43] I wanted to ask you something about the difference between you and Susan Collins on this issue, [2:48] because a lot of people that went to vote yesterday had microphones stuck in their face and said, [2:53] well, what do you think about all the controversies surrounding Graham Plattner? [2:56] And they said, well, we don't like it. [2:58] They seemed, some reports, especially disturbed by the sexting stories. [3:03] But they said, we don't like it at the same time. [3:08] And then they listed all the things that Susan Collins had done to hurt their families, to hurt the state of Maine, to hurt the economy. [3:16] And so they were kind of, some people were gritting their teeth and voting for you. [3:21] And again, we'll get into that in a second. [3:23] And I'm curious, though, for those people and for Republicans that may want to vote against Donald Trump and what he's done over the past two years, [3:35] spell out the differences on this issue, on Iran, between yourself and Susan Collins. [3:44] Because of my military service, and, you know, I did four tours in the infantry. [3:48] I fought in both Iraq and Afghanistan. [3:53] I saw up close the human cost of war. [3:56] War, to me, is not something to be viewed as a game. [3:59] It's not something to be viewed as a power play. [4:02] It's something to be viewed as the single last resort for anything. [4:09] Because I know what it looks like. [4:12] I know what it smells like. [4:13] I know what it feels like. [4:14] And I know the struggles that come afterwards. [4:17] I want to be a very loud voice in the United States Senate, pushing back against the kind of, frankly, military adventurism that has brought us the last 30 years. [4:30] And Susan Collins is the exact opposite. [4:34] Susan Collins voted for the war in Iraq. [4:37] She continued to support it long after it seemed like it wasn't working. [4:40] Even just the other day, when asked about those votes, she justified it by saying, well, it was because of 9-11. [4:49] I mean, I was under the impression in 2026 we were all quite aware that 9-11 had nothing to do with Iraq. [4:57] But here we have a United States senator who is supposed to wield an immense amount of power and know a lot about the state of the world, [5:04] who still, all this time later, can't even bring herself to admit that she supported an illegal war built on lies. [5:12] That does not engender a lot of confidence that she'll continue to make decent judgment calls. [5:18] And, I mean, the Iran stuff is also perfect evidence of this. [5:23] She's been supportive. [5:24] She will occasionally try to say, like, oh, I don't like it. [5:28] But then, of course, when push comes to really shove. [5:30] I mean, she voted for the war, I think, what, five times at this point? [5:34] Or at least did not vote against. [5:38] And so, I mean, I just, for me, if there is any, I mean, there are a lot of very clear distinctions between myself and Susan Collins. [5:46] But on foreign policy and on war, I don't think you can get one that's more clear. [5:53] Right. [5:53] You talked about some of the problems that went along with service in the military for you and the other men and women who have so proudly served this country. [6:03] With all of the controversies, with the scandals, so-called scandals, it depends on a voter's point of view on whether the controversies are scandals. [6:14] A lot of it, you have said, had to do with PTSD when you came back from service. [6:22] And, my God, I know families for generations have seen loved ones experience this, even when they didn't call it PTSD. [6:32] The law you're in me, though, wants to try to figure out, what's the timeline? [6:38] Without, well, I was going to say without getting too personal, but I guess you kind of need to get very personal if you want to represent the people of Maine in the United States Senate. [6:47] Give us a timeline for your struggles with PTSD and how you believe it impacted you personally and explains many of the character failings that you yourself have talked about as you've tried working through these. [7:06] What's the time frame for that PTSD and where are you now? [7:11] Are you still experiencing, again, I speak in ignorance because I didn't fight in Iraq and Afghanistan or any war. [7:18] So, forgive me if this last part is ignorant. [7:21] Do you ever get past PTSD or does it stay with you? [7:24] So, I'll just say, I mean, look, much like any kind of treatment or therapy, much like getting over any kind of trauma, there isn't, like, one day where you're not doing well and then one day you're magically good again. [7:40] It's a journey. [7:41] It's a long journey. [7:43] It requires, at least in my case, it required a lot of love and support for my community and my family. [7:50] It required a lot of support from the VA, which I'm very lucky that I got. [7:54] I got home from my fourth deployment in 2011 and I got out of the Army in 2012. [8:01] 2012 to 2016 was pretty dark for me. [8:05] I was in Washington, D.C. [8:07] I was going to college, but I was not. [8:10] I felt very isolated, very alone. [8:13] At that point, I was receiving no treatment whatsoever. [8:15] I came out of the infantry in a time where we just didn't really talk about the fact that we were all suffering. [8:22] It was this whole idea that we're just going to be tough and get through it. [8:24] And it was not an effective solution. [8:30] In 2016, I moved back to Maine. [8:33] When I came back here, for one, I got involved in the VA system, which then gave me access to a lot more treatment that I had access to in D.C. [8:41] And things began to improve. [8:43] But it's a journey. [8:45] I mean, I left D.C. in a pretty dark place, and it took me a number of years back here in Maine to really kind of find myself. [8:53] I will say the single best thing that happened to me is in 2017, I was exposed to oyster farming. [8:58] And in 2018, I started to do that full-time. [9:04] And from 2018 to last summer, that's what I did. [9:09] And sitting on the boat out in Frenchman Bay, looking across at Acadia National Park, talking to the seals and the eagles and relaxing with the bivalves, [9:18] that honestly did almost more for me than anything else. [9:23] But it is a – it's just – it's continuous. [9:27] And I wake up every single morning just trying to be a little bit better and a little bit kinder than the way I was before. [9:33] And, you know, eventually you just get to a point where you begin to feel much more fulfilled and much happier. [9:39] And, yeah, for me, around 2021 was when I really started to feel like I was myself again. [9:48] And – but, you know, I still go to therapy, still talk to my doc. [9:53] My wife Amy and I, we still – we still share and communicate, like, our kind of true selves to each other, [10:01] which is, of course, as you guys probably know, always a bit of a struggle. [10:03] But – but it's one that is incredibly, incredibly fulfilling and well worth it. [10:09] And it's made me a, I think, very, very happy and very fulfilled person. [10:18] Well, first of all, the sights and sounds that you described from Frenchman's Bay to Acadia National Park, [10:26] I know very well, and I could see how that would actually bring a lot of clarity, [10:30] that it's a beautiful, incredible way of life in Maine, the way life should be. [10:37] And I also think that a lot of families who have struggled with their tours of duty in the years after [10:43] can really appreciate what you're sharing and also showing that therapy is not a weakness. [10:50] Therapy is building strength. [10:52] And I can appreciate all of that. [10:54] If I'm in your campaign or if I'm high up in the Democratic Party, at this point, I have a few questions [11:01] in terms of the health of your campaign moving forward into the general, which is a whole different ballgame. [11:07] So here's my first. [11:08] You were asked this question by Chris Hayes about the issue of, is there more out there? [11:14] What else could be out there that might be revealed during the campaign? [11:19] And you deflected, said, among other things, this is between you and your wife. [11:22] It was understandable to a limit because for Maine voters in a general election, the question is, what is out there? [11:31] What is not in your possession that you sent to others who may have in their possession? [11:37] How many concerning pictures and or text messages are in the possession of other people that could be used against you? [11:48] And I'd like to know if there are pictures concerning pictures. [11:53] I will just say that the nature of Amy and I's relationship has been blown, I would say, totally out of proportion. [12:03] Early in our marriage, we had some struggles and we worked through them because that's what you do when you're in love with somebody. [12:11] And it made our marriage much stronger, made us, frankly, a much happier and communicative couple. [12:18] I was single for the majority of my adult life. [12:25] I was in my 20s and 30s and I dated. [12:29] And, you know, that's in the modern age. [12:32] That's what happens. [12:34] You date people and you use dating apps and you do all this stuff. [12:39] And frankly, that all happened long before I got married and happened long before I decided to run for the United States Senate. [12:45] But I can just tell you, there is nothing out there that is going to be, will run counter to any of the stories that I've talked about openly this entire campaign. [12:56] And I know everyone continues to be like, oh, what else is coming? [13:00] You know, ironically, the whole what else is coming has essentially been the same thing the whole time, which is I've been very open about the fact that I struggled, very open about the fact that I had a long list litany of failed relationships for years because I myself was not in a good place. [13:18] And then every now and again, we will have a media outlet or a politically motivated attack come up and try to drag it all up. [13:27] But it's all very much within the exact same story that I've told this entire time. [13:34] Okay. [13:34] So you say there's nothing out there that could be concerning. [13:40] And this may seem a little bit rich. [13:42] There's nothing out there that's actually concerning. [13:49] People will make everything seem very concerning because that's what people do in politics. [13:57] But, you know, I think the thing about all of this is what I find to be kind of most curious is this is what everyone wants to make the campaign about. [14:08] So we do not talk about the struggles of working manners. [14:13] We do not talk about the fact that I know someone in my hometown here who works three jobs and pays over 60% of her income in rent. [14:22] I think that matters a lot more than the details of my relationship before I ran for United States Senate. [14:33] That's just me. [14:36] Okay. [14:36] So then let me ask you this way. [14:38] Can you just talk about the nature of the sexting in terms of can you call for the release of the Epstein files? [14:47] And can you call out those who have abused women and not be conflicted in any way? [14:55] Yes, of course. [14:57] I mean, I engaged in consensual romantic activities with adults at an earlier part in my life. [15:04] That seems like a fairly normal thing most people do. [15:06] So going to an island with billionaires to possibly assault children is a vastly, vastly different thing. [15:17] Yeah. [15:17] Do you wish that this had come out earlier and in your own way? [15:24] No. [15:24] I mean, this was a very private thing for my wife and I. [15:27] And the only reason it's out is because we can fight it. [15:30] And someone we trusted on the campaign who then went and broke that trust. [15:36] So it's I mean, Amy and I, Amy, I have a very strong marriage. [15:40] And it's mostly strong because of some of the challenges we faced early on and the work we did to get through it. [15:46] So, no, I mean, I'm I'm I'm I'm not happy it's out. [15:51] But it's also it it's not a again, I would say it's been entirely blown out of proportion as to what the reality of the situation is. [16:02] Mr. Plattner, good morning. [16:02] Let me ask you about the race ahead now that you won by a wide margin last night. [16:07] Susan Collins hasn't really had a close race in a long time. [16:11] Six years ago, it was under double digits. [16:13] She won by eight points. [16:14] But there always seems to be this idea because Maine and presidential elections goes blue by and large, [16:20] that this is the time that Susan Collins is going to be defeated. [16:24] And yet it never seems to be. [16:25] So why do you believe this time Mainers will walk away from Susan Collins, as I assume you believe they will? [16:32] Well, I believe they will, because I am a normal Mainer and I have lots of normal Mainer friends and everybody, [16:42] Republicans, Democrats, independents. [16:45] A lot of people in this state are sick and tired of someone who, for decades now, [16:51] has not really stood up for the people of Maine. [16:54] Someone who will not hold the Trump administration to account. [16:58] Someone who has gotten quite wealthy while in office. [17:01] Trading stocks and bonds, which is a very unpopular thing for those of us down here that don't have stocks and bonds. [17:08] Someone who promised to protect Roe v. Wade and then went and voted for Brett Kavanaugh [17:15] and brought about the destruction of a woman's right to choose in this country. [17:20] Those are real things that people see. [17:24] And they bring about material realities for us down here on the ground. [17:27] And I am fully convinced that people in this state are sick and tired of this kind of politics-as-usual, [17:43] like, corporatist establishment politician, which Susan Collins really is the avatar of. [17:49] Now, I will say this. [17:51] The Republican Party, the people that donate to Susan Collins, the people that support her, [17:56] they know the stakes of this thing. [17:57] And so they are dumping millions of dollars into the state of Maine in attack ads against us already. [18:04] We'll say, for anybody who's watching at home, if you want to see Susan Collins beaten, [18:08] please go to grantforsenate.com and donate. [18:10] We can definitely use the help. [18:11] But the stakes of this are so high, because we really are looking at, [18:16] is this country going to be able to go in a direction of a politics that is accessible, [18:21] a politics that is representative of regular people, and then a politics that therefore represents [18:28] regular working people? [18:30] Or do we maintain the status quo? [18:33] Do we maintain a politics that allows for billionaires and corporations to continue to [18:38] get richer and richer and richer year after year, while those of us that work for a living [18:43] work harder and longer and for less? [18:46] And I think the answer to that up here in the state of Maine is people want change. [18:49] As you've been hearing for months from your Democratic opponents and now will grow louder [18:54] with the Collins campaign and Republicans even nationally, the argument against you is [18:59] that all of the comments that you've talked about and addressed and said you were at a [19:02] bad time in your life, the past comments about black people calling yourself a communist, [19:07] talking about police, talking about armed resistance for the working class, they say that's who [19:13] you really are and that you've kind of cleaned yourself up to run this campaign to get into [19:17] the United States Senate. [19:18] So how do you, for people just kind of tuning into this race, perhaps even in Maine, but [19:23] certainly nationally, how do you address that criticism? [19:26] Because it's kind of at the heart of the argument against you, which is you actually are that [19:31] guy from 10 or 12 years ago and that you've polished yourself for the election. [19:36] What do you say to that? [19:39] I would say that they really do not grasp what is happening up here in Maine because they continue [19:46] to try to make this race about me and what they fail to understand is it's not about me at [19:52] all. [19:52] It's about us. [19:54] It's about Maine. [19:55] It's about the working people of this state. [19:57] And since this thing started, we have been told time and time again by supposed political [20:06] geniuses who are professionals and really know what they're doing, that the campaign was [20:10] over. [20:11] Why even try? [20:12] It was sunk. [20:14] And we've been counted out time and time again. [20:16] And then it doesn't happen. [20:19] And the reason is, is that they count us out. [20:22] They're trying to count me out. [20:23] And what they forget is that it's that they've been counting out working people for so long [20:29] that all of us down here in the real world, we want to see a different kind of politics [20:34] now. [20:35] And this is the difference, I think, between the punditry, the difference between the [20:39] national media and then the reality here on the ground. [20:42] This entire race has been essentially living in two worlds. [20:48] You've got the national media level, the larger discussion, all the politicos talking [20:53] about what they think is going to happen. [20:56] And then there's Maine, where something else entirely is happening. [21:00] It's why we won last night with a huge margin. [21:04] And it is, and we're just going to continue to do that. [21:08] I'm going to continue to go out all over the state of Maine. [21:11] I've held 83 town halls in the past eight months. [21:15] Susan Collins hasn't held one since I was in eighth grade. [21:19] I have talked to tens of thousands of Mainers. [21:23] And people come and they can ask me questions directly. [21:25] We don't screen questions. [21:27] We don't, I don't, I don't believe in a kind of politics that is not accessible. [21:31] You have to go out and talk to people directly and hear from them directly if you think that [21:37] you are going to go represent them. [21:39] That's what we do. [21:40] And that's frankly why it continues to work. [21:44] Well, I, we, we, we wanted to keep you for the full three, four hours, but you have to [21:49] get to Bar Harbor. [21:51] And, and, uh, apologize to your campaign for, for us because they said he's gonna miss the [21:58] event. [21:59] We, we appreciate you being here, but, uh, with apologies to my executive producer [22:04] and also, uh, your campaign staff. [22:08] I have one more question for you. [22:08] Um, so, um, Susan Collins, the last time she ran, won by nine points in a state. [22:17] Joe Biden carried by nine points. [22:21] We've never, I, I, I mean, that's how things used to be when I was younger. [22:26] It hasn't been that way in a very long time. [22:29] So she has shown extraordinary resilience. [22:31] Nobody knows that better than you. [22:33] Yeah. [22:33] What makes 2026 different? [22:37] One is that Roe has now been overturned. [22:41] I mean, people often forget this, but in 2020, we tried to hang the millstone of Brett Kavanaugh [22:46] around her neck, but materially, Roe still stood. [22:50] She could still point to it and tell people, no, no, no, it's okay. [22:53] I know what I'm doing. [22:54] I'm protecting a woman's right to choose. [22:56] We now know that that was entire falsehood and that has now entirely changed. [23:02] And then there's just the other element, which is that I don't know what it's like for a [23:08] lot of folks around this country, but I can say that here in the state of Maine, things [23:12] have gotten significantly harder down here in the real world. [23:16] You know, I live in Eastern Maine. [23:17] We are down to two birthing centers in this part of the state. [23:21] There were six when I was born. [23:22] We are watching rural hospitals across the state close because of the Medicaid and Medicare [23:29] cuts out of the one big, beautiful bill that the Republicans passed to justify tax cuts [23:35] to corporations and the ultra wealthy. [23:38] Susan Collins did nothing with her power to stop that from happening. [23:44] And as we watch a deterioration in the material conditions that working people are living in, [23:52] we are all down here looking for a different kind of politics. [23:55] That was just not the case in 2020. [23:57] And I think that's the huge shift. [23:59] And then there's just something a little bit deeper, which is that at this point in the Trump [24:06] era, you cannot be pro-Donald Trump and anti-Donald Trump at the same time. [24:13] That's a needle that's impossible to thread. [24:16] Everything is too extreme. [24:17] Everything is too obvious and glaring. [24:19] And that's the needle that she tries to thread. [24:23] And you just can't do it. [24:25] You come across as duplicitous. [24:27] You come across as trying to pull the wool over people's eyes. [24:30] And in this era with Donald Trump and Susan Collins' total inability to really stand up to him [24:37] and hold him to any kind of account, people now see her, I think, as this kind of just [24:43] establishment politician who doesn't really believe in anything and isn't willing to stand up to [24:48] protect her constituents. And that's what's changed. [24:52] Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate in Maine, Graham Plattner, thank you very much. [24:56] It's great to have you on. We'll see you once again soon. [24:59] Thank you. Congratulations on the win last night. [25:01] Vice cabinet or something. [25:02] Thank you very much. [25:03] Good to have you. [25:03] All right. [25:03] Thank you.