Maine Democrats on Saturday overwhelmingly nominated Troy Jackson, a former state Senate president and logger by trade, as their party’s nominee to challenge longtime Republican incumbent Susan Collins in November’s high-stakes US Senate election.“Well, thank you, Maine,” Jackson, 58, said after securing the votes of 566 of 571 delegates during Saturday’s special Democratic convention at Cross Insurance Center in Bangor. “Today we turn the page, today this becomes a general election campaign, and today we win the work of defeating Susan Collins in November.”“For nearly 30 years, Collins has told Maine that she is ‘concerned’,” Jackson said, referring to the 73-year-old incumbent’s go-to word when President Donald Trump and Republicans attack rights and justice. “She was concerned while she rubber-stamped Trump’s Medicaid cuts and gutted our healthcare.”“She’s concerned when she cut taxes for corporations and the wealthy,” he continued. “Concerned when she confirmed justices who overturned Roe v. Wade. And really tragically, she was concerned when she gave [US Immigration and Customs Enforcement] billions to terrorize our neighbors and murder people in the streets with no accountability.”“But concern does not lower the costs of groceries or gas,” Jackson said. “Concern does not keep our monitoring wards of rural hospitals like down in Lincoln County open. Concern does not restore all the rights that she’s taken away. Maine does not need another six years of concern. We need someone with courage. We need a fighter, and we need a senator who remembers exactly who sent them to Washington.”“So if you’ve ever been ignored, underestimated, pushed around, or told that you have to wait your turn while the rich cut the line, I’m asking you to stand with us in this campaign,” he continued. “If you believe in your heart that healthcare is a right, stand with us. And if you believe that workers deserve power, stand with us. And if you believe our freedoms are worth defending, stand with us.”“And if you believe that Maine deserves a senator who will fight like hell for working-class people, well, stand with us,” Jackson added. “We have a party to unite, we have a movement to build, and we have a senator to defeat.”Jackson’s improbably rapid rise followed former Democratic nominee Graham Platner’s withdrawal from the race earlier this month amid allegations of sexual assault and abusive behavior. Supporters of Platner’s progressive platform warned at the time that they would not back a replacement candidate who did not share the same pro-worker, anti-war agenda.While Collins spokeswoman Blake Kernen called Jackson a “low-energy version” of Platner, Maine Democrats decided the fifth-generation lumberjack fit the bill.“The working class has been left behind and forgotten about,” Shelly Mountain, a former Aroostook County Democratic Committee chairwoman and Jackson delegate at the convention, told NBC News. “He is definitely working class and always—has always—been a champion for the working class.”Progressive politicians, advocacy groups, and labor organizations cheered Jackson’s nomination, with Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) saying that “he’s ready to fight for working people and flip this seat.”International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAM) president Brian Bryant said Saturday that “Troy Jackson knows firsthand what it means to work hard for a living and fight for a better future for working families.”“Throughout his career, he has stood shoulder-to-shoulder with union members and working people, never backing down from a challenge when workers’ rights were on the line,” he added. “He represents the strength of a people-powered movement focused on fairness, opportunity, and economic justice. Troy has our full support as he heads to the general election.”
A Democratic Senate hopeful on Saturday shredded Robert F. Kennedy Jr. like the lettuce Americans are now afraid to eat. U.S. Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed (D-MI) tore into the scandal-plagued Health and Human Services secretary as the nation faced a Cyclospora parasite outbreak — linked to contaminated shredded iceberg lettuce — under his watch. "The last time I checked, the guy who's running Health and Human Services for this country works out in jeans," El-Sayed quipped. "Meanwhile here in Michigan we're trying to dodge lettuce." El-Sayed was met with cheers and roars of laughter — the reference to Kennedy was met with boos. This is not the first time Kennedy has been mocked for his strange gym habit of working out in denim. A Vogue contributor tried it and decided the HHS secretary was "insane." "All I felt was sticky and desperate for a clean pair of sweatpants," Emma Specter wrote in February. "My experiment in RFK Jr.-style jeans-clad exercise wasn’t the worst thing I could have experienced by following his lead (I could have a rubella rash or, at the very least, a nasty case of E. coli contracted from frozen bear patties right now). Nevertheless, it… wasn’t great."Nor was this the first ribbing Kennedy faced this weekend. On Friday, President Donald Trump took aim at his Health secretary in front of a room of journalists at the White House Correspondents' Dinner. "I hope that everyone finally got to enjoy their entire very delicious beef tenderloin," Trump said. Then he pointed to Kennedy and said, "[He] personally ran over the cow in his car."This was likely a reference to Kennedy's habit of collecting road kill for strange purposes — among them a bear cub crime scene frame-up in Central Park. These odd quirks of Kennedy's prompted El-Sayed to tell his crowd of supporters in Michigan, "I think we might be able to use a public health Senator right about now."
An alarmed House Democrat said Saturday that President Donald Trump may consider sending the military into yet another country — and for the "dumbest" reason. Rep. Mark Pocan (D-WI) delivered a scathing rebuke of a new Trump administration report that takes aim at Cuba during a Saturday segment on CNN."Two-thirds of this report is about the '60s and '70s, and all of a sudden they jump to today," Pocan said. "It's so ridiculous. It's probably the dumbest report I've read in my 14 years of being here, and whoever wrote it should be embarrassed."The Trump administration's continued blockade against fuel coming into Cuba has caused trash to pile up in the streets and power outages, CNN reported. The Trump administration carried on the blockade even as it ended a naval blockade against Iran.Pocan was tearing into a report released by the State Department earlier this week that accused Cuba of promoting left-wing extremism in the United States. The Democrat described it as "fantastical" and warned, "This report by the State Department, I think, is setting up a military action."Pocan told CNN that the U.S. campaign against Cuba is largely being pushed by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and added that Rubio could be arguing for greater U.S. military involvement."We're already in a quagmire in Iran, but I think this is Marco Rubio's personal South Florida pet project," Pocan said. "He wants us to go into Cuba in a way that I don't think the American people support."
An angry Democrat dared the Trump administration to look the children of men killed by immigration officers in the eye — but suggested they might be too scared. Rep. James Walkinshaw (D-VA) slammed the Trump administration for failing to attend a public hearing on deaths caused by its Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers — and called out his suspected reason why. "They're afraid, he said. "They are scared." Walkinshaw appeared on MS NOW Saturday morning to address what "The Weekend" host Eugene Daniels described as the "lying" and "untruths" about how two fatal ICE shootings "went down." Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero was killed in Maine on July 13 — just days after Lorenzo Salgado Araujo was shot dead in Texas, reports show. The Virginia Democrat had recently returned from Houston, where Araujo, 52, was killed by ICE and falsely accused by the FBI of possessing illegal drugs. As U.S. Rep. Sylvia Garcia (D-TX) confirmed Friday, the construction worker had electrolytes to help him keep hydrated. Walkinshaw felt compelled to go to Houston that same day, he said. "I wanted to... be able to look into their eyes and see and feel that that pain that they're experiencing," said Walkinshaw. "And bring it back with me to Washington and try to communicate it to my colleagues, especially our Republican colleagues."But Walkinshaw argued Republicans would rather "pour salt in the wounds" of families whose loved ones have died in ICE's hands, pointing to Renee Good and Alex Pretti, two American citizens shot dead in protests, as proof. "It is disgusting what this administration is doing to families like this," he said. "It's character assassination." Walkinshaw then shared information from a closed-door briefing he held with ICE officials last week. Data show that out of 22,000 ICE officers, just one has faced disciplinary action. "There is no accountability in ICE right now," he said. "And it comes from the very top. In the Oval Office."This is why Walkinshaw professed himself outraged the Department of Homeland Security and the FBI "flat out refused" to send a representative to Friday's public hearing. Walkinshaw argued they didn't have the guts to face the children of the men ICE agents had killed. "They are afraid to to face communities like the community in Houston," he said. "After what has happened, I don't think they want to have to look Lorenzo and Ronaldo in the eye and see what they have done."
Maine Democrats on Saturday are poised to announce their nominee to replace Graham Platner in the race to unseat incumbent Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine). Former state Sen. Troy Jackson is the likely pick. Platner withdrew his bid earlier this month following allegations of sexual abuse. Meanwhile, President Trump has issued warning after warning to Iran…
