Rep. Jake Auchincloss (D-MA) slammed his party’s own Senate candidate in Maine on Monday night, refusing to endorse Democratic oyster farmer Graham Platner over his controversial tattoo that closely resembled Nazi imagery.
Platner, the only remaining candidate running for the Democratic Senate nomination in Maine, has caught heat over the past several months for once sporting a now-covered-up tattoo of an image largely associated with the Nazi’s infamous Death’s Head symbol.
“I find that tattoo and his commentary about it to be personally disqualifying,” Auchincloss, a Jewish Democrat, stated in a CNN interview.
The symbol was used in the Holocaust by Adolf Hitler’s SS-Totenkopfverbände, the unit responsible for the Nazi’s concentration camps. Platner has noted he did not know the meaning behind the symbol, telling the public that he received the tattoo in his 20s while drinking with his fellow Marines.
Auchincloss previously appealed on Platner to drop his bid in the Senate race last October, weeks after Gov. Janet Mills (D-ME) declared her candidacy in the Democratic primary in the race. Susan Collins (R-ME). However, Mills has now dropped her bid, making Platner the only candidate in the Democratic field and clearing the way for him to take on incumbent Sen.
Some leftist Democrats, such as California congressional candidate Saikat Chakrabarti, are criticizing Auchincloss for weighing in against Platner.
“Absolutely no excuse for a Democrat in the House to back a Republican for Senate in a crucial swing seat. Auchincloss should be primaried. His primary election is September 1 in a safe, D+11 seat,” Chakrabarti wrote on X.
“I think it would be a mistake for the Democratic Party to think that Graham Platner’s brand of the Democratic Party is what wins us durable majorities throughout this country,” Auchincloss remarked on CNN.
Auchincloss’s decision to weigh in and buck his party’s likely nominee in Maine is noteworthy, given the seat’s unique position in a swing state that went for former Vice President Kamala Harris in 2024 by a 6.9 percentage point margin, but has also elected Collins, a Republican, to the Senate for five consecutive terms.
Platner, a leftist, is backed by New England progressives such as Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), who have stood by the oyster farmer despite the tattoo scandal and in the face of a slew of other controversies, including explicit now-deleted Reddit posts. Platner currently holds an approximate 7-percentage-point advantage over Collins, per recent polling.
