Jordan Wood, a longtime Washington, D.C. staffer running as a Democrat to unseat Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) displayed the true extent of his fearlessness on Monday when his campaign barred Maine Wire reporter Seamus Othot from his “Courage Not Concern” “public” town hall in Kenebunkport.
“I’m saying it’s a private event, and we’d like you to leave please,” said a campaign staffer, barring The Maine Wire from the allegedly public event.
Wood announced his “public town hall” on Friday as part of his initiative to hold an interactive event with potential voters in all 16 of Maine’s counties, in an apparent effort to contrast with Sen. Collins, who has not held a public town hall in over 25 years.
The Maine Wire pre-registered online for the event as press, confirming that Othot would attend the event. Wood’s promotional material for the event specified that it was public numerous times.
That claim appeared to be false.
When this reporter arrived at the event, the campaign staffers manning the registration booth “could not locate” his name among the registrants, they said. It is not certain whether his registration was intentionally deleted because he listed The Maine Wire as his employer, but staffers did not appear to have any difficulty locating the registration of other attendees.
The reporter was directed to another, higher ranking campaign staffer, who appeared to be in charge of the event. When the staffer realized that Othot was with The Maine Wire, he immediately barred him from entering the ostensibly public event.
The staffer repeated variations of “this is a private event,” apparently afraid to let The Maine Wire hear what Wood had to say, or ask questions. Outside the building, the campaign had hung signs demanding that no one record video of the event without prior authorization, casting more doubt on the town hall’s “courage not concern” tagline.
Despite barring The Maine Wire from accessing the Kennebunkport town hall, Wood’s campaign is maintaining that his events are open to the public, according to a Tuesday direct message on the Blue Sky social media platform, obtained by The Maine Wire.
From an exterior view, the event did not appear to be drawing a youthful crowd, with many attendees entering the building appearing to be past retirement age.
Wood himself confirmed that assessment on Tuesday when he posted an image of the event, in which the vast majority of the audience appears to be elderly.
The age of his enthusiastic supporters appears to be consistent no matter where he holds his events.
Though Wood has attempted to appeal to working class Mainers by harkening back to his middle-class childhood in campaign materials, he currently lives with his husband and the baby they obtained in a $3 million Bristol mansion.
