Sanders remains quiet as pressure grows for Platner to quit amid rape claim

A bombshell rape allegation has thrown Maine Senate candidate Graham Platner’s campaign into turmoil, but some of his most progressive supporters in Congress are standing by him.

At least three Democratic lawmakers — Sens. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., Chris Murphy, D-Conn., and Chris Van Hollen, D-Md. — have yet to withdraw their support or call on Platner to end his campaign after Maine resident Jenny Racicot, 41, accused him of rape in interviews with Politico and CNN.

Asked by Fox News Digital about Racicot’s allegation that Platner in 2021 barged into her home while intoxicated and forced her to have unprotected sex, none of the lawmakers responded by publication time.

The muted response marks the latest sign that some progressives are sticking with Platner despite mounting scandals threatening the viability of his Senate bid.

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Some Platner allies have viewed his rise as part of a broader fight over the Democratic Party’s direction, with the Senate hopeful embodying a more populist, far-left vision.

Maine Democrats rejected Platner’s primary rival, Gov. Janet Mills, D-Maine, who was aligned with the party’s establishment, and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y. Mills suspended her campaign weeks before the June primary amid poor polling and fundraising struggles.

Other leading leftists, including Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., and Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif., quickly rescinded their endorsements of Platner and called on him to exit the race. Similarly, Schumer and Senate Democrats’ campaign arm, which had only endorsed Platner after his June primary victory, demanded the immediate suspension of his campaign.

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., who previously called a physical abuse allegation by former Platner girlfriend Lyndsey Fifield “a lot of nothing” in an interview with NOTUS, withdrew his support for Platner on Tuesday following Racicot’s rape accusation.

His statement comes as Democrats face mounting scrutiny over their responses to the accusations against Platner, after years of taking a hard line on sexual misconduct allegations.

“A lot of people owe apologies to Lyndsey Fifield — most notably Sheldon Whitehouse, who dismissed her allegations on the grounds that she worked for ‘right-wing political operations,’” journalist Josh Barro wrote on social media.

Sanders, a leader of the party’s leftist base who campaigned with Platner several times, was notably silent after Racicot’s rape allegation. He continued to support the Senate hopeful after Fifield’s allegations first emerged in early June and similarly during reports that Platner sent sexually explicit text messages to at least half a dozen women while married.

“We got a housing crisis. People can’t afford healthcare, they can’t afford groceries, they can’t afford to fill up their gas tanks. And I think it’s important for us to focus on the issues facing working families a little bit more than Graham Platner’s marriage,” Sanders told reporters in June in remarks obtained by NBC.

Murphy, too, publicly defended Platner after news broke about Platner’s infidelity to his wife, Amy Gertner, who he married in 2023. He continued to embrace the Maine Democrat’s Senate bid after Fifield and other women accused Platner of abuse.

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And amid the piling up of controversies, Murphy suggested that Platner still had more character than incumbent Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine.

“Graham Platner is somebody who served our country, he’s served his community; he’s also made mistakes, and he’s admitted that,” Murphy said during an interview with CBS News in May. “Character also involves standing up to people who are bankrupting and corrupting this country.”

“And this race is going to be a contrast between somebody who has put his life on the line for this country, against somebody who is literally empowering the moral hollowing-out of our nation from the White House,” he went on.

Meanwhile, Van Hollen, a progressive senator with leadership ambitions, went to the mat to defend Platner amid scrutiny over his Nazi-linked tattoo and controversial online posts in which he declared himself a communist, disparaged law enforcement and Black people and White rural Americans, and mocked a teenage girl’s suicide.

“He’s been very clear that he went into combat on behalf of the United States, he went through a really rough period, PTSD-type period,” Van Hollen told Punchbowl News in April.

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“He himself said there are lots of things he’s done and said that he completely regrets, and I do believe people should have second chances and that people can learn from their mistakes, and I think he’s been doing that,” he said.