With less than 75 days to go before Maine Republicans in the Second Congressional District will pick a candidate to face incumbent Democratic Rep. Jared Golden, former President Donald Trump on Wednesday endorsed Rep. Austin Theriault (R-Fort Kent) over his opponent, Rep. Mike Soboleski (R-Philips).
Many Maine GOP insiders see the Trump endorsement as a fatal blow to Soboleski’s underdog bid, a stamp of MAGA authenticity that a well-funded Theriault can ride from now until the June 11 primary in a district that has overwhelmingly voted for the former president in recent elections.
But if Theriault is pleased with Trump’s blessing, so to is the man he’ll face in November’s general election.
In comments to the Washington Examiner, Rep. Golden delivered some trollish lines needling Theriault as a “neoliberal” who, according to Golden, contemplated running for the State House in 2022 as a Democrat before running as a Republican.
“I’d rather face a neoliberal like Austin Theriault than another Marine like Mike Soboleski,” Golden told the Examiner.
“But it’s funny that Trump would back someone who just a few years ago was talking about running as a Democrat instead of backing the guy who has supported Trump all along,” Golden said. “I guess the Washington establishment wants Theriault.”
His comments are doubtless a calculated move to sow division among GOP rank-and-file as he heads into what could be his toughest re-election fight yet. It’s not an accident that the comments were made to a right-of-center Beltway publication.
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While Golden, like many Democrats and left-of-center commentators, obviously intends the remark as a pejorative, the term “neoliberal” generally connotes someone who backs free market policies, deregulation, decreasing the role of the government in economic matters.
Neoliberalism, as understood by its proponents, advocates a minimal role for the State while elevating individual liberty and economic freedom. But on a crasser level, the term has come to invoke the specter of David Brooks-style squishy Republicans or even centrist Democrats.
By typical DC logic, Theriault is now a prohibitive front-runner in the GOP primary race. Even before receiving the endorsement from the Republican Party’s celebrity standard-bearer, the Aroostook County native had a massive 10-1 fundraising lead over Soboleski, who has struggled to attract the kind of donations needed to get a candidate’s message up on TV and radio.
Although Soboleski has notched a few county-level straw poll wins at GOP caucus events, Theriault’s campaign war chest — reported in Jan. to be more $350,000 — will now help ensure that every GOP voter from Farmington to Lubec knows which candidate as been tapped via TruthSocial by the Man from Mar-a-Lago.
Theriault, 30, and Soboleski, 67, have both yet to finish their first terms as state lawmakers, but in that short time, the two candidates have diverged on a number of issues. That’s resulted in Soboleski receiving top marks under the Conservative Political Action Committee’s (CPAC) score card, compared with Theriault’s comparatively liberal ranking. Those differences will loom large in the first primary debate on April 30. However, an endorsement from Trump could render more nuanced comparisons of voting records impotent.
Although Maine’s CD-2 doesn’t often get national attention, the general election will be a competitive race that could decide the partisan balance of the House of Representatives regardless of who wins the White House in the fall. The most recent Cook Political Report listed the race as a “Democrat Toss Up” and polling has showed Golden’s approval rating underwater with registered voters.
With President Joe Biden deeply unpopular and mired in multiple scandals, the Lewiston native will be forced to defend the national Democratic Party’s open border policies, prolific deficit spending, and disastrous foreign policy, even if Golden has strategically departed from Democratic leadership on a few votes.
Plus, Golden reactively staked out an anti-Second Amendment position following the Oct. 25 mass shooting in his hometown of Lewiston. In the days following the tragic killing spree, Golden, who himself owns a semi-automatic rifle, called for a prohibition on the sale and ownership of so-called assault rifles.
In a district with more semi-autos than voters, that’s going to be a tough position to defend.
Ummm, did Golden forget that Trump used to be a Democrat too. People are allowed to switch parties, just like Golden switched his stance on gun control. Bye, bye Golden we gave you a shot and you have failed us.
I am waiting for the Independent to switch.
So phony Golden is trolling? He must be scared sh**less! A leftist puppet that just before election raises his finger in the air to see which way the wind is blowing! And if not for rank choice voting and a phony supposed conservative on paper only and financed by democrats we would have had a real conservative. Watch for more stunts that takes your eye off the far left puppet. And I wouldn’t be surprised if Trump wasn’t doing a deep fake before the primary. All I care is Golden is gone, he stabbed every firearm owner in the back with his phony change of little mind. And his blindly voting as he’s told record!