PRESQUE ISLE, Maine — Nearly 3,500 people from Presque Isle and 17 surrounding communities participated in Tuesday’s elections, voting on Congressional candidates, ballot issues and races for the Maine Legislature.
It was a quiet day in the voting booths, as many chose to vote with absentee ballots because of the COVID-19 pandemic. In Presque Isle, a majority (52 percent) of the city’s 1,208 ballots were absentee. Comparably, only 7 percent of the city’s 1,323 votes were from absentee ballots in the 2018 primary election. There were 6,731 registered voters in Presque Isle (2,363 independents, 2,130 Republicans and 1,937 Democrats), according to Maine Secretary of State data from March 2020.
Local races for probate judge, county commissioner, state senate and state house all went uncontested. Yet voters from Presque Isle to more rural locations like Castle Hill and Portage Lake got the chance to weigh in on hot button congressional and ballot races.
Republican voters across the Presque Isle area had varied responses to who they wanted to face Rep. Jared Golden, a Democrat, in the election for Maine’s 2nd Congressional District in November.
All three candidates — Eric Brakey, Adrienne Bennett and Dale Crafts won cities and towns in the Star-Herald’s coverage area. Brakey won in Ashland, Fort Fairfield, Masardis, Perham, Washburn and Westfield, while tying with Crafts in Castle Hill and Nashville Plantation.
Yet, Crafts came first in Presque Isle and many of the area’s most populous towns, including Blaine, Bridgewater, Easton, Mapleton and Mars Hill. Bennett achieved slim victories in Chapman and Portage Lake.
Overall, Crafts won a clear victory in the Presque Isle area with nearly 40 percent (601 votes) of the vote to Brakey’s 32 percent (480) and Bennett’s 29 percent (437). Craft’s margin was below his district-wide victory of 45 percent from preliminary numbers obtained by Bangor Daily News as of Wednesday afternoon. Though the vote still needs to go through a ranked-choice voting tally, Brakey and Bennett have conceded the race to Crafts.
Craig Green, a 49-year-old insurance agent in Presque Isle and a member of the Presque Isle City Council, said that Crafts had a “proven track record of winning” that put him above the other two candidates.
“He’s the only businessman who is in the race,” Green said. “Adrienne’s a lovely person, but she’s not been elected in a capacity of this sort. Brakey went through this before and didn’t do anything last time.”
The race for the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate was far less contentious. Sara Gideon took all 18 of the polling locations in the Star-Herald’s coverage area, often by large margins. In the Presque Isle area, she ended up with 74 percent of the vote (889 total votes) to Betsy Sweet’s 19 percent (224 votes) and Bre Kidman’s 7 percent (90 votes).
Gideon’s margin of victory was slightly higher in the Presque Isle area than across Maine, where she received 72 percent of the vote to Sweet’s 23 percent and Kidman’s 6 percent as of Wednesday afternoon.
Many Democratic voters zeroed in on Gideon’s legislative accomplishments and record. Many believed it was enough to propel her to victory against long-term U.S. Sen. Susan Collins, a Republican, in November.
Malcolm Coulter, a 76-year-old teacher from Presque Isle, said Gideon’s moderate record would help her in a general election.
“While I like the other twos’ progressive ideas, I think it’s a lot harder for people too far to the left to win an election like this,” Coulter said. “Sara Gideon’s a little closer to the center.”
Jason McGuiness, 45, of Presque Isle said he was motivated by first-hand experience with Gideon — he had seen what she had done as a legislator representing Freeport when he previously lived in the Lewiston-Auburn area. He was confident the Democrats would unseat Collins with Gideon at the helm.
Questions 1 and 2 — which were some of the only races that could be voted on by independents on Tuesday — were both heartily approved in the Presque Isle region, receiving 73 percent and 74 percent approval, respectively.
The questions — which approved multi-million dollar bonds on high-speed internet and transportation — were similarly approved across the state. A total of 75 percent approved Question 1 and 78 percent Question 2 as of Wednesday afternoon.
Though the election came during a nationwide surge in coronavirus cases, most who came out to vote said they weren’t worried about health consequences. The Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention had documented 24 total cases of COVID-19 in Aroostook County as of Wednesday, three of which are active.
Michael Waugh, a 40-year-old teacher of Presque Isle, said the city’s social distancing protocols, which included six feet distance in line and a request for voters to wear masks, made him feel safe.
“Presque Isle thankfully is not an area that has been highly impacted by COVID so far,” Waugh said. “So, I felt fairly comfortable coming today”.
