1 Newspaper Had the Best Response to the Governor of Maine's Appalling Racism

By Eleanor Sheehan

In response to Paul LePage's repeated racist remarks as governor of Maine, a local newspaper has taken a powerful stand. The Portland Press Herald apologized to the country for his insensitive words, saying, "Please forgive us — we made a terrible mistake. We managed to elect and re-elect a governor who is unfit for high office."

The letter was promoted after LePage said during a press conference on Aug. 25 that he has a "three-ring binder" full of photographs from the drug arrests in Maine. (See his comments in the video above.) The Republican, who has served as governor since 2011, continued by describing the photographs as "black and Hispanic people from Waterbury, Connecticut, the Bronx, and Brooklyn," drawing outrage from those calling him a racist and saying the police department profiles people of color. What's more, after a reporter at the press conference implied that Demoratic Representative Drew Gattine had called the governor racist, LePage left Gattine a scathing voicemail filled with profanity.

Over the course of LePage's political career, he has insulted Hispanic and black people and then defended the comments. Back in January, at the town hall seen in the video below, LePage was describing Maine's dire drug problem, characterizing the people who import drugs as "guys with the name D-Money, Smoothie, Shifty — these types of guys — they come from Connecticut and New York, they come up here, they sell their heroin, they go back home." He continued, "Incidentally, half the time they impregnate a young white girl before they leave."

The paper's letter from the editorial board criticized the governor for "identifying the drug runners by race, leaving it to his audience to fill in the blanks of why that might matter" and ended the note writing, "On the bright side, America, LePage isn't going to be governor forever, and when his successor takes office in 2019, Mainers of all political parties will have to work together to fix the damage he has done to our reputation."