WASHINGTON — Most Senate Democrats are giving a wide berth to Graham Platner’s campaign for Senate in Maine as the progressive first-time candidate fights for his political survival amid controversy over his past online racist and anti-LGBTQ comments and a tattoo with Nazi imagery that he covered up this week.“What I’ve seen so far does concern me,” Sen. Andy Kim (D-N.J.) said of Platner on Thursday, before making clear he didn’t plan to get involved in the race. Asked if she could see herself supporting Platner’s campaign, Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.) shook her head no. Baldwin, the first out lesbian elected to the Senate, declined to say anything further.Other rank-and-file Democrats said they wouldn’t be getting involved in the primary. Top progressives in the Senate have also declined to back Platner. The only progressive who has endorsed Platner is independent Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont.“I personally think he is an excellent candidate. I’m going to support him and look forward to him becoming the next senator in the state of Maine,” Sanders told reporters this week.Democratic leadership, meanwhile, is backing Gov. Janet Mills, the state’s two-term governor who, at age 77, is widely viewed as the establishment candidate in the race. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), in a rare move this week, publicly announced his support for Mills despite staying neutral in every other Senate primary across the country. He called her “tested” and the best choice to oust five-term incumbent Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine).Their hesitance comes as two polls show Platner with a large lead over Mills among Democratic primary voters, reflecting Platner’s rapid rise from unknown military veteran to progressive hero. The surveys show any establishment effort to bring Platner back down to earth may not be similarly rapid.A survey from the University of New Hampshire found Platner with a 58% to 24% lead over Mills, while one from the National Republican Senatorial Committee gave Platner a 46% to 25% edge. Both surveys are remarkable, considering Mills has served in the state’s highest office for almost eight years while Platner was unknown at the beginning of August. Platner, a 41-year-old oyster farmer, was active on Reddit boards after serving four tours as a Marine in Iraq and Afghanistan. He made all sorts of inflammatory comments, dismissing concerns about sexual assault in the military, using homophobic slurs, disparaging rural Americans and calling all police “bastards,” among others. He has since apologized for his “abhorrent” words, saying he no longer agrees with them.“It’s important to know that this was a time in my life where I was struggling deeply,” Platner explained after apologizing earlier this week. “I got out of the Army in 2012. I had PTSD, I had depression, I had all of the things that come with serving in a war ― two wars ―that I eventually began to not believe in at all. It left me feeling very unmoored. It left me feeling very disillusioned, very alienated and very isolated.”On Wednesday, Platner’s campaign addressed another controversy by announcing he had gotten a tattoo of a skull and crossbones on his chest covered to no longer reflect an image widely recognized as a Nazi symbol. He explained he had gotten it in his 20s while in the Marine Corps after a night of drinking in Croatia.All the revelations about Platner’s background prompted one of his primary challengers to call on him to withdraw from the race. Jordan Wood, a former staffer for Rep. Katie Porter (D-Calif.), called Platner’s comments and tattoo “disqualifying.”“With Donald Trump and his sycophants demonizing Americans, spewing hate, and running roughshod over the Constitution, Democrats need to be able to condemn Trump’s actions with moral clarity. Graham Platner no longer can,” Wood said in a statement. U.S. senatorial candidate from Maine Graham Platner speaks at a town hall at the Leavitt Theater on October 22, 2025 in Ogunquit, Maine.Sophie Park via Getty ImagesBut the negative coverage of Platner’s history didn’t seem to affect his supporters, 600 of whom packed a town hall in Ogunquit, Maine, on Thursday to hear the candidate speak. “The establishment is spooked,” Platner said at the event. “If they thought that ripping my life to pieces, trying to destroy it, was going to make me think that I shouldn’t undertake this project, they clearly have not spent a lot of time around Marines.”Some Democrats said they sympathized with Platner’s struggles even as they refrained from making an endorsement in the race, preferring instead to wait and see how the primary shakes out. “As someone who probably had the same experience as he did, I hope he’s gotten the therapy he needs. He said those things as a young man, so hopefully he’s grown out of that,” Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.), another Marine veteran who struggled with PTSD, told HuffPost.“Everyone has a right to grow and grow out of their stupidity, essentially. And I think voters should take the opportunity to evaluate that,” he added. Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), who served in the Marine Reserves during the Vietnam War era, praised Mills’ record and said she has a “clear path” to challenging Collins, a top Democratic target next year. But he said it was ultimately up to the voters of Maine to decide. “Earlier this morning, I was asked whether Janet Mills is a risky candidate because of her age,” Blumenthal said on Thursday. “You know, there is never such a thing as a sure win in American elections, so anybody who enters an elective contest is risking the potential loss, but they’re both viable candidates.”