Maine Senate candidate Graham Platner’s wife told a campaign aide during a vetting exercise last summer that she had previously found “sexually explicit texts with several women” on his phone.Amy Gertner told the campaign’s then-political director Genevieve McDonald about her husband’s extramarital relationships “to make sure they didn’t pose a risk to her husband’s nascent campaign,” according to the Wall Street Journal. Gertner and Platner got married in November 2023.The report is the latest in a long list of controversies that have plagued Platner’s campaign and bid to unseat incumbent Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME). The progressive candidate has faced criticism for derogatory, since-deleted social media posts and a controversial tattoo resembling a Nazi symbol.
Platner has been the presumptive Democratic nominee in the race since Gov. Janet Mills (D-ME) dropped out in April. A recent University of New Hampshire poll has Platner up nine percentage points against Collins in a theoretical matchup.
Gertner said in a statement provided by the campaign that McDonald was a friend. A campaign official said aides decided the matter was ultimately private and was being handled in marriage counseling.
