A few weeks ago, I drove up to Greenville, Maine to watch Graham Platner hold a town hall in one of the most conservative counties in the state. After the event I met Linda and John Bohl, longtime Greenville residents and Platner supporters.

Thursday’s episode of Unorganized Territory will feature my conversation with Linda and John. We cover a wide range of topics in addition to their support for Platner. I hope you’ll give it a listen.

Subscribe now

Here’s an admission that will surprise few people who know me well: I’m addicted to political news. I make time each day to devour whatever compelling podcasts, newspaper stories and magazine pieces I can fit in. Politics is not a beat I was especially draw to as a public radio reporter. But as journalists working in small to medium-sized newsrooms all know, there are times (legislative hearings, campaign coverage, election nights) when every reporter and editor gets pulled into political coverage.

As a news consumer and political junkie, there’s no shortage of reporting and stories to feed my addiction.

I appreciate the work of certain well-sourced reporters in Washington, covering the White House and other government agencies, who cut through the fog of propaganda to deliver an accurate snapshot of what’s actually happening inside Trump 2.0. I’m grateful for incisive coverage of the federal courts, the U.S. Supreme Court and how this vital pillar of our constitutional system is functioning in a time of maximalist assertion of executive power. The two major parties are currently at war over redistricting across the country and smart, in-depth coverage is critical to understanding the powerful political and financial interests battling to influence how our Congressional maps are redrawn. I’m also a sucker for the inside-baseball stuff: the sausage-making stories about strategy, strategists, polls, advertising, campaign finance and the scandals of the moment.

As I developed the concept for Unorganized Territory, my decision to cover the 2026 election through the voices of Maine voters was influenced less by the political media I consume on a daily basis and more by the reporting and storytelling that has most captured my imagination during my own obligatory stints as a reporter on the campaign trail.

My jam falls into two basic buckets: the way policies, implemented by those we elect, are playing out in the lives of real people with no skin in the game; and the complicated mixture of personal qualities and public service ideals that motivate candidates to run for office and allow some, but not others, to connect with voters and build political movements.

Being related to two U.S. presidents, as I am, is not exactly a common occurrence and has certainly influenced my interest in these questions.

So has a few of my reporting experiences over the years.

I spent a week traveling through southern Illinois in early 2002 with a Republican candidate for U.S. Senate who literally believed that he was the second coming of Ronald Reagan. The election was still months away, but the candidate, a complete unknown, already had a sizable staff at his beck and call. In his chauffeured car, between events, he spent most of his time on the phone calling potential donors. His ego though, even at this early stage, seemed to get in the way of his ability to connect with the limited number of folks showing up at his press conferences and events. He came in third in the primary.

Things worked out very differently for another unknown candidate I was lucky enough to cover.

I will always remember being in the office of 848, the daily news program at WBEZ-FM Chicago, and learning one morning about an Illinois State Senator who would be appearing shortly on the show.

“Who is Barack Obama?” I asked no one in particular. To which the late, great Teshima Walker, then an 848 producer, casually replied, “Oh, he’s going to be President of the United States someday!”

I came to understand this possibility, even likelihood, myself during my months covering Obama’s 2004 U.S. Senate campaign.

Two moments stand out.

On the evening of July 27, 2004, my editors sent me to the Billy Goat Tavern to cover candidate Obama’s keynote address to the 2004 Democratic National Convention. TVs in the bar were broadcasting the convention, but no one seemed to be paying much attention. That quickly changed as Obama’s speech began. Patrons in the packed bar crowded near the TVs in hushed silence as Obama’s address surged towards its memorable “red state blue state” crescendo. At the end, there was an unmistakable sense that those in the room had witnessed something historic together.

I saw this magnetism on display again a few months later, when former two-term Republican governor, the late Jim Edgar, invited Obama to address students at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, where Edgar was teaching at the Institute of Government and Public Affairs. From the moment he set foot on campus that October afternoon, Obama was mobbed by surging crowds of young people who would later become part of the diverse coalition of voters that twice elected him President of the United States.

For those who think I’m about to compare Graham Platner, the Sullivan oyster farmer and political neophyte, to Barack Obama—I’m sorry to disappoint you.

What is true, though, is that Platner has drawn consistently large crowds (for Maine) to his town halls across the state since he launched his campaign last year.

The crowd in Greenville, while small compared to other Platner events, was still notable for a rainy Monday night in March in conservative Piscataquis County.

I went to Greenville because I wanted to watch Platner interact with voters to better understand his appeal in a race where his opponent, Maine’s outgoing two-term governor Janet Mills, isn’t exactly chopped liver.

Why, exactly, is he igniting something resembling a political movement in Maine?

For roughly two hours, Platner laid out his priorities and answered voters questions on health care, the economy, tax policy, the growing divide between the most well off in America and everyone else, immigration enforcement and anger with Senator Collins over her votes on the One Big Beautiful Bill and the president’s ability to wage war with Iran.

Voters in this gymnasium responded enthusiastically to Platner’s gruff, plain spoken communication style, sharp denunciations of the Trump Presidency and messaging joining Susan Collins and Donald Trump at the hip.

According to a slew of recent polls, Platner is now the Democratic frontrunner in the primary.

No one has a crystal ball of course.

If he wins, Platner will most certainly face a hard-fought campaign against perhaps the most resilient Maine politician of the modern era—someone who has consistently won tough races when counted out.

What is also true, though, is that Maine’s senior U.S. Senator has never had to run for re-election in an environment quite this inhospitable.

It will be a fascinating campaign to watch.