Graham Platner and the Rise of White-Male Identity Politics

Platner’s rocket to stardom reflects something ugly that’s developed, not only on the right but the left as well.

Democratic Senate candidate Graham Platner at a “Fighting Oligarchy” tour event in Portland, Maine, on May 25, 2026.

(Sophie Park / Bloomberg via Getty Images)

As of Wednesday morning this week, even after his sexting scandal broke, I knew two things about Maine Senate candidate Graham Platner: I was glad I didn’t have to vote in Maine, and that if I did, I would probably hold my nose and vote for Platner. Senator Susan Collins is despicable, her vote for Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh unforgivable. Defeating her is essential.

It’s Friday morning, and now I know deep down I could never vote for Platner. (I’m still glad I don’t vote in Maine so I won’t be tested on Tuesday.)

Platner, as most of the political world now knows, was accused Thursday afternoon in a New York Times story of behaving in “unsettling” ways, as one of the women put it, to at least three girlfriends, between 2013 and 2021. As many people also know, especially Platner stans, the worst allegations in the article—that he was physically abusive, and that he knew his “skull and bones” tattoo was an SS Totenkopf , which he has repeatedly denied—came from a conservative GOP operative. Do I like that? No. But I believe her, and I don’t believe Platner.

The Maine oysterman has been through a lot since his 20-year-old Totenkopf was revealed in October (he had no idea it was a Nazi symbol, he said. He’d danced with his shirt off at a wedding, in front of his Jewish family!). Then came allegations that he had posted, on Reddit and other social media, various icky thoughts about women, Black people, and gay people. He said both the tattoo and the sometimes outrageous Reddit posts were a product of his PTSD and alcoholism from his military service, which included not only the Marines but a stint at the mercenary group Blackwater. He asked for understanding and compassion. He received it.

But consider this, when you think about whether to trust him: If the New York Post is to be believed, as recently as Tuesday he told Senators Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, who’ve endorsed him, that there were no more muddy boots to drop, and that the “worst” of the rumors they might be hearing weren’t true. Then he canceled the rest of his Washington meetings and ran home to Sullivan, Maine, to do damage control on the coming New York Times story. Even if you don’t believe that story, or don’t want to believe the Republican victim, you’d have to count what he told Sanders and Warren as something akin to a… lie, wouldn’t you?

Platner did something similar in his interview with MSNOW’s Chris Hayes last night. When Hayes asked him whether there were other “texts, photos, floating around that will hurt the campaign,” and whether he worried about it, the candidate brushed it off: “I’m not worried about it. There may be things out there, but they’re before I was in politics and a public figure.” He repeatedly depicted the negative stories coming out against him as what happens when you’re “going up against an entrenched political machine.” Disapproval was only coming from “career politicians.” Platner went on: “My journey is one of transformation.”

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And my journey is one of disillusionment, and maybe some regret that I ever believed him. Dude, you got into politics last August. So anything that happened, say, that spring must be forgiven?

Yes, I’m a little pissed off. I’ve been Platner-skeptical since the Totenkopf reveal, but my Maine friends and acquaintances, as well as people I respect in the broader progressive community, love him. But I think Platner’s rocket to political stardom reflects something ugly that’s developed, not only on the right but on the left too: The only acceptable form of “identity politics” now is white-male identity politics. On the left, women and people of color have been told since Kamala Harris lost in 2024, even going back to Hillary Clinton’s loss in 2016, that we are the problem; our “identitarianism” drove away moderates and white men in 2016, and in 2024, even some Black and Latino men.

Over and over we’ve been told: We gotta support candidates, like Platner, who have a lot of guns, and pickup trucks, and tattoos, and a military background, even if it includes Blackwater; a history of racist and sexist remarks and gay slurs on social media, and a history of shady behavior toward women, because it’s the only way to reach white working-class men.

I’d say that’s pretty insulting to white working-class men.

Let me add a couple of other points on the last two Platner scandals involving women. The sexting —which took place after he was married, and which was revealed by his wife to the campaign—actually bothered me, because it reflected recent behavior, not his post-combat meltdown. And for the record, it wasn’t normal old sexting (who among us?) but use of a semi-anonymous app called Kik , fr…