Graham Platner, the Democratic Senate candidate in Maine, has responded to claims that he allegedly sent sexual text messages to other women.

Platner became the de facto Democratic nominee after Maine Gov. Janet Mills (D) withdrew after falling far behind in the polls and fundraising. Platner is currently leading incumbent Sen. Susan Collins (R) in the polls. He is a key player in the Democrats’ long-shot bid to retake the U.S. Senate in November.

On Sunday, Platner was answering questions following a campaign event hosted by the Maine People’s Alliance in Portland.

Platner accused the media of running “gossip” rather than focusing on his policy positions.

“They never want to talk about policy,” he said alongside his wife, Amy Gertner. “I have a very loving and very happy marriage. They would very much like to try to rip that apart.”

“They’re going to come after us in every awful way that they possibly can, and we’re just going to keep talking about the fact that the hospitals are closing, the fact that child care facilities are closing, the fact that teachers and nurses aren’t paid enough and the fact that everybody down here continues to work harder and longer and get less,” the Senate candidate added.

Platner’s comments came after The Wall Street Journal and the New York Times published stories on May 30 reporting that Gertner flagged the text messages to Genevieve McDonald, the former political director of his campaign.

Gertner allegedly viewed the text messages as a potential political liability, according to McDonald.

On May 31, Platner said McDonald’s claims were false, but he did not clarify specifically what those claims were.

“We talked about things in Amy and I’s marriage that we’ve gone through over the years,” the candidate shared. “We talked about that because that’s our marriage, and we discussed it with the campaign. What Genevieve McDonald claims isn’t true.”

However, Platner’s campaign team recognized the text messages.

After taking questions in Portland, he released a written statement saying that he and his wife “went through something hard, because of [him].”

“I’ve learned throughout this campaign that people don’t care about gossip or headlines; they care that you’re fighting for their hospitals, their paycheck, their kids,” Platner wrote in the statement. “This campaign is about the ideas that will move Maine forward and past a broken politics of the past. Our opponents want politics to be empty of content and empty of actual change — and beating that is exactly what our movement is about.”

In October 2025, Platner revealed on social media that he got a tattoo of a skull and crossbones while in the Marine Corps.

He had it for some time, but he said it was “brought to his attention” that the tattoo resembled a Nazi symbol. He then chose to have it covered with a Celtic knot, with a dog-like creature at its center.