Graham Platner, Democratic US Senate Candidate from Maine on MSNBC Cable News — at the end of April 2026. He is a Well-Read History Buff as Well as Oyster Frmer and Vet.
This past weekend, Graham Platner, candidate for the US Senate, hosted his first ever Veterans Town Hall, bringing together veterans, military families and Mainers to call out forever wars, the politicians who profit from them, and the political establishment that continues to send working-class Americans to fight them.
The charismatic Platner was joined by veterans from across Maine, representatives from Veterans for Responsible Leadership (VFRL), which endorsed his campaign, and close friends and fellow Marines he served alongside with who flew in from across the country to see him on the campaign trail.
At the event, Wade Spann, a veteran and one of Graham’s close friends, introduced him, saying, “Even in the tough days when I lost my brothers to suicide, he would be there for me quietly taking up space for me to be able to vent my frustration. Since then, Graham has always been a steadfast brother to me…….When I started to question my own contributions to the war, he was the one that sort of opened me up and exposed me to the lies that I had been fed and the hard truths of combat……But having Graham there to tell me the truth, knowing that we weren’t going through this alone, was supportive to me in my healing journey. Graham is going to be a fighter for you all as well.”
“While I don’t pretend to speak for every veteran out there, the majority I’ve spoken with over the years all agree on one thing: we got screwed over by our own government and by a system that weaponized our patriotism against us,” said Scott Peoples, VFRL Executive Director. “Veterans need Graham Platner in the Senate to lead this crucial fight to stand up for those who served and protect the next generation from politicians who care more about their donors and political ambitions than the lives of their constituents.
A Marine Corps and Army veteran with four infrantry tours, Platner experienced firsthand the human cost of the forever wars that politicians like Susan Collins continue to support. Collins has taken money from defense contractors, backed another endless war with Iran and stayed silent as working families get crushed by rising gas prices and another generation of Americans is sent off to fight overseas.
“I dont know anybody who thinks the war in Iran is a good idea. Republicans, independents, Democrats, friends of mine who just don’t even care about politics because they’re so jaded — everybody knows that this is stupid,” said Graham Platner. “It’s a war that has started because Donald Trump is in the Epstein files and he doesn’t want us reading them. It’s a war that’s been started because Benjamin Netanyahu has tried to get it going for 30 years and he finally found an American president stupid enough to do it. It’s a war that’s been started because it fills a deep hole in Pete Hegseth’s masculine insecurity and because every single time we hit a girl’s school with a Tomahawk missle, a Raytheon executive makes a profit.”
From voting to limit veterans’ access to medical marijuana, to opposing nearly $2 bilion in veterans heath care funding, to supporting Trump’s budget bill that put Maine Veterans Homes at risk of closure, to standing by while hundreds of VA jobs left the state, Susan Collins, has lined her pockets while veterans across Maine pay the price.
Veterans, service members, and military famliies in Maine and across the country deserve a Senator who will fight for the people who served this country — not the defense contractors, lobbyists and political establishment that keep sending them to war.