JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:
In Graham Platner, Maine Democrats thought they'd found a winning formula to bring working-class voters back into their coalition this election season. But the charismatic progressive who rose to national prominence withdrew from the race under the weight of scandal. Now another working-class politician who's not known for viral speeches has less than 100 days to try and beat Republican Senator Susan Collins. Maine Public's Steve Mistler has more on Troy Jackson, the logger turned progressive firebrand.
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STEVE MISTLER, BYLINE: Nearly a year before Troy Jackson replaced Graham Platner on the ballot, he replaced him on the rally stage at an event in Portland. Like Platner, Jackson launched into a broadside against the political establishment.
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TROY JACKSON: And they don't want somebody with grease on their hands or s*** on their shoes...
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JACKSON: ...Someone who talks funny, didn't go to the right school and doesn't share their pedigree. To them, that is what we are, nobodies.
MISTLER: That self-proclaimed nobody now carries Democrats' hopes of flipping a critical Senate seat. Jackson says he wants to harness the energy Platner built, but he's also blazed a much different path, a journey that began nearly three decades ago in Maine's remote North Woods.
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UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: For the second time in a year, a small group of unemployed Maine loggers erected a blockade to stop the influx of Canadian woodcutters into the Pine Tree State.
MISTLER: That's how Maine Public described a standoff in 1999 that launched Jackson's political career. Jackson and other loggers used their pickup trucks to blockade a border crossing, protesting Canadian woodcutters coming into the state and saying that they were taking away American jobs and driving down wages.
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JACKSON: It's gone down from what it was 10 years ago. I mean, I don't make near what I used to 10 years ago.
MISTLER: Being a logger back then meant unpredictable work and pay. It also meant working far from home for days at a time. In a speech during his 2014 run for Congress, Jackson recalled how his son would hold tightly to his hand because he didn't want his father to leave.
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JACKSON: As if all the strength that he had in that little hand could counter generations of corporate greed that was keeping other young children in the St. John Valley from their parents. It was during those long Sunday nights that would turn into early Monday mornings that I stopped accepting things for the way that they were and started thinking about the way that they should be.
MISTLER: Jackson's fiery speech failed to rescue his congressional primary bid, but he continued to climb in the Maine legislature. He claimed the working class as peers and invited confrontations with those he says are their enemies - corporations, business owners, even governors. In 2013, then-Republican Governor Paul LePage made headlines for insulting Jackson.
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PAUL LEPAGE: People like Troy Jackson, they ought to go back in the woods and cut trees and let somebody with a brain come down here and do some work.
MISTLER: LePage later apologized for insulting loggers, but not Jackson. Jackson eventually became the Senate president in 2018, and his party affiliation and positions on social issues changed as he climbed the political ladder. Early on, he earned top ratings from antiabortion rights groups. In 2009, he opposed a bill legalizing same sex marriage. He's since tacked sharply left, but his old voting records surfaced in attack ads during this year's Democratic gubernatorial primary.
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UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: Mainers just can't trust Troy Jackson on abortion. He earned a 100% rating from Maine Right to Life, voted for legislation that could ban abortions.
MISTLER: Jackson ultimately finished third in that primary. Now he's prosecuting Democrats' case that Susan Collins betrayed women who support abortion rights by voting to confirm the Supreme Court justices who overturned Roe v. Wade.
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JACKSON: You know, I'm rock solid on this now, and Susan has been the opposite. You know, I mean, I wouldn't say she was very good on it to the beginning, but she certainly is not good on it now.
MISTLER: Jackson's voting record won't be the only thing under the national microscope. Critics are questioning his temperament, including a dustup with former state legislator Charlotte Warren. She got into a shouting match with Jackson five years ago over a criminal justice bill. Warren, who backed Jackson at the nominating convention, called the incident a family fight.
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CHARLOTTE WARREN: Troy and I are bare-knuckle brawlers. We believe in what we believe in, and we're going to fight for it.
MISTLER: Warren says the U.S. Senate needs more fighters like Jackson. But to get there, he'll first need to beat Collins and the well-funded Republican machine that's backing her.
For NPR News, I'm Steve Mistler in Brunswick, Maine. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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