Good day from Augusta, where the ad wars are ramping up in Maine’s hotly contested races for governor and the 2nd Congressional District, which are likely to be the most interesting and expensive campaigns of this cycle.
In the 2nd District, U.S. Rep. Bruce Poliquin, a Republican, and Assistant Maine House Majority Leader Jared Golden are extending their fight on gun rights, while gubernatorial candidates are still working to define themselves — one with lots of help from outside interests.
Poliquin is selling voters on gun-rights groups’ poor assessment of Golden, while the Democrat dredged up an old clip of the incumbent. Poliquin, a second-term congressman, was boosted last week by an endorsement from the Sportsman’s Alliance of Maine — which aligns with the National Rifle Association on gun issues — that also sharply criticized Golden for not filling out a questionnaire or participating in an interview with the alliance’s board.
Golden, a Marine veteran of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, issued an ad last week that showed him target-shooting. This week, Poliquin was up on the radiowith a minute-long ad portraying two Mainers discussing Golden’s record.
That ad hits him for a “failed NRA rating” (he got a 21 percent rating from the group in 2017) and labels Golden as “a radical, risky, Nancy Pelosi-style partisan” — a reference to the Democratic House minority leader and Republican bogeyman.
To read the rest of “Breaking down what Maine’s candidates and their allies want you to hear,” an article by contributing Bangor Daily News staff writer Michael Shepherd, please follow this link to the BDN online.
