Maine Governor Janet Mills is finding herself increasingly isolated within her own party as all five Democrats running to succeed her have declined to endorse the $300 relief checks she is pushing as a condition of her support for the state’s final budget.
Three of the five — former state public health chief Nirav Shah, former clean energy executive Angus King III, and former Maine Senate President Troy Jackson — explicitly said the state should not tap surplus funds for the checks, which would go to roughly 514,000 Mainers. All five candidates backed the 2% millionaires tax that lawmakers added to the budget proposal with Mills’ support.
Shah said he supported the minimum teacher salary increase and the millionaires tax as “critical steps forward,” but said he “would not drain the rainy day fund right now” for the relief checks. He argued those reserves “would do far more good invested directly in food assistance, MaineCare, and property tax relief for working families.”
King called the budget full of “good, practical ideas” on housing, property taxes, health care and education, but urged caution on spending down state surpluses. “While a $300 check can make a real difference for many, I wish that it was much more targeted, so we could keep more of our powder dry to defend against the Trump cuts as they come,” he said. (RELATED: Flip-Flop Or Political Play? Governor Mills Embraces Millionaires Tax She Once Opposed Amid Senate Primary Bid)
Jackson, who has run aggressively against Mills throughout the primary while citing long-standing disagreements on tribal rights, taxes, labor and prescription drug legislation, suggested Mills’ shift toward the millionaires tax was driven by the entry of Graham Platner into the U.S. Senate race. “It is amazing what difference a year makes,” Jackson said. “I guess all we needed was for Graham to get in the Senate race.”
Former state House Speaker Hannah Pingree, who previously ran Mills’ policy office, believes “the wealthiest should pay their fair share” and would pursue additional measures to make Maine’s tax code more progressive, according to her spokesperson. She did not answer a direct question about the relief checks.
Secretary of State Shenna Bellows also declined to address the checks directly, saying she would work with lawmakers to expand affordability-focused portions of the budget. “The budget contains a lot of promising things, like a millionaire’s tax and direct property tax relief,” she said.
The intraparty friction comes at a difficult moment for Mills. She holds just a 40% approval rating according to a recent Emerson College poll and enters the U.S. Senate primary as the underdog against newcomer Graham Platner. Maine has not elected consecutive governors from the same party in more than 70 years — a historical headwind for whichever Democrat wins the nomination.
The Democratic governor’s budget faces united Republican opposition in the legislature, leaving Mills to navigate both a fractured primary field and a hostile minority as she pushes her final spending plan across the finish line. (RELATED: Maine Marijuana Testing Bill Clears Legislature With Bipartisan Support, Now Heads To Governor’s Desk)
