Troy Jackson operated alias account that trolled former Maine governor: Report

Maine‘s Democratic Senate candidate, Troy Jackson, ran an anonymous political trash talk account that he used to troll former Gov. Paul LePage and other state Republicans while he served in the state Senate.Jackson managed an alias account called “Canadians for LePage” while LePage served as governor in 2012, commenting on negative statements about the then-governor and the state’s GOP on Maine’s Bangor Daily News website, according to a CNN review released Thursday.The report from the outlet comes nearly one week after Maine Democrats nominated Jackson to fill the party’s Senate nominee vacancy left by embattled former candidate Graham Platner, who stepped back from the race in the wake of sexual assault allegations made against him, which Platner denies. Jackson has platformed a similar populist, anti-establishment message to the one Platner campaigned on, as he sets his sights on the November general election against Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME). According to the outlet’s analysis, the “Canadians for LePage” account was tied to Jackson through several records and an email address connected with the Maine logger. Jackson made several disparaging and negative statements toward state Republicans through the alias, including one in which he ribbed LePage, replying to another commenter’s message on an article about the state budget, saying, “you are no more a woodsman than LePage is a Governor.”Many of the comments were related to a dispute in Maine at the time about cross-border labor laws with Canada. Jackson had sponsored a bill that curtailed the use of foreign labor for logging on state lands, which he said was meant to protect Maine jobs, but LePage vetoed the bill. CNN highlighted several comments from Jackson’s alias ribbing LePage for the decision, including one that read, “But you like the government program that allows us Canadians to come and work in the US, right?”Several of the over a decade-old comment threads cited in the outlet’s report appear to no longer be publicly available on Bangor Daily News’s website.“Troy has been a strong and consistent advocate for workers’ rights and for a government that works for the people,” Jackson’s campaign adviser BJ McCollister told the Washington Examiner. “Republicans are scraping the bottom of the barrel because they know Susan Collins cannot defend nearly 30 years in Washington spent siding with [President] Donald Trump and corporate special interests over Maine working people.”A spokesperson for the Jackson campaign also pointed to the fact that many of the comments were “largely mundane political arguments and sarcastic jokes about Paul LePage, Canadian logging, and the same issues Troy was fighting for publicly.” Jackson had alleged in a public statement at the time of LePage’s veto that the move signaled an alignment with Canada over Maine. LePage denied this, claiming the law was unconstitutional, according to Bangor Daily News.“The logging season is about to kick off and there are plenty of northern Mainers that are eager to work,” Jackson said. “The question I’d like to ask the governor is, ‘Whose side are you on?’ His veto sent the message that he’s on the side of our neighbors to the north.”JANET MILLS KEEPS COOL ON ENDORSEMENT OF TROY JACKSONThe Washington Examiner has reached out to LePage for comment.LePage is currently running for Congress in Maine’s 2nd Congressional District.