The Democrat-controlled House of Representatives attempted to ban Maine Wire reporter Jon Fetherston from entering the House chamber alongside other members of the media on Wednesday.
First, some show and organization notes: As you may have noticed, there are some new names and faces at the Maine Wire.
Newspaper and talk radio veteran Tom Shattuck has joined us as the Managing Editor. In edition to handling editorial duties at the Maine Wire, he’ll be hosting and train-conducting new weekly live content via Maine Wire TV, which you’ll be able to find on the Robinson Report and YouTube, as well as the Maine Wire’s social media properties.
Reporter Jon Fetherston needs no introduction since he’s already announced his entrance into Maine politics by doing more journalism in a few months than some Maine journalists have done in three years. Fetherston is also a media veteran and has some experience working in government, which I’m sure you’ll hear about on a future episode of Maine Wire TV.
The Robinson Report will continue to produce interviews, solo shows, and deep investigative reporting as we did in 2025. As always, you can subscribe with a free or paid subscription to support our work, follow us across social media, submit tips and/or hate mail at tips@themainewire.com, and share our work with other people who might want to know what’s really happening in the state of Maine.
As for today’s events, the episode covers what happened and what our response will be as an organization. Democratic leaders and staffers took unprecedented and dishonest steps to bar the Maine Wire’s access to areas of the State House that have always been open to all media and really anyone with a video camera who can behave themselves. Maine has no “press credential” and, outside of Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., the “press credential” isn’t even a thing.
Bob Lindstrom, the Sergeant-at-Arms for the House of Representatives, profiled and discriminated against Jon Fetherston and, on multiple occasions, attempted to bar him from accessing the House chamber. Lindstrom cited his reasoning for denying access Fetherston’s lack of a non-existent press credential. House Speaker Ryan Fecteau (D-Biddeford) and his clerk both denied that this had happened, but multiple State House sources have confirmed what took place.
We’ve filed Freedom of Access Act requests with the Executive Director of the Legislature Suzanne Gresser for all communications that Lindstrom received concerning the Maine Wire, as well as a request for Gresser’s and her staffers’ communications about the Maine Wire. We will find out who attempted to stamp their jackboot on press freedom today. We already know why they did it.
Very obviously: Democrats and Democrat staffers conspired to block the Maine Wire from accessing the House chamber because they are very, very worried about former Gateway Community Services employees Rep. Deqa Dhalac (D-South Portland) and Rep. Yusuf Yusuf (D-Portland) talking to media. Dhalac, according to her financial disclosures, was then Assistant Executive Director of “Gateway Community Services,” the private, for-profit arm of the embattled organization. Yusuf, a longtime friend of Gateway’s CEO, had an ambiguous but high ranking job
As I’ve explained in previous news letters and media appearances, Gateway Community Services wasn’t just some random case of get-rich-quick fraud. Gateway Community Services — the staff, the buildings, the resources — was and remains an extension of the Democratic Party, including the Mills Administration.
Yusuf and Dhalac are the two best examples of this close connection and symbiotic relationship, and both of them have long, close, and enduring relationships with Gateway Community Services CEO Abdullahi Ali. Yusuf and Dhalac remain the elected officials at the State House, along with Sen. Jill Duson (D-Cumberland), who are best positioned to speak to the fraud allegations facing the organization.
