Self-Avowed Democrat Portland Press Herald Columnist On Governor’s Payroll Accuses Maine Wire Of Duplicity?

When Steve Collins first got hired by the Maine newspaper that publishes paid content from the state’s Democrat governor, he came out of the closet.

Collins, upon his appointment as political columnist, announced he was a Democrat.

“Since I’ll be writing a fair amount about state and local politics in this new role, I should tell you up front that I’ve been a Democrat since day one,” Collins proudly boasted a year ago.

Not that it was a surprise by any means.

“No party commands my loyalty,” he promised readers – or however many subscribers the Maine Trust for Local News still claims.

Yet all of a sudden now he’s blasting the news outlet (that’s leaving the Portland Press Herald literally in the dust) for streaming a GOP gubernatorial debate.

“I watched the snoozefest unfold thanks to a livestream from the Maine Wire, the right-wing media outlet that exists to help conservatives win elections, as its editor admitted at a recent GOP fundraiser,” Collins wrote Monday.

Now the oops…

He apparently forgot that the Press Herald has accepted thousands of dollars from Democrat Gov. Janet Frills to publish material favorable to the party of which he boasts membership.

“The Maine Trust for Local News has agreed to publish fawning coverage of the Mills administration in exchange for taxpayer dollars,” Ed Tomic, a Maine Wire reporter, wrote nearly two years ago.

Tomic said Mills paid $120,000 to the Maine Trust for Local News, which the owns the Portland Press Herald, to publish state-sponsored articles praising her administration’s use of federal-education dollars.

“The articles are intended to bolster ‘goodwill’ toward the state’s public school system and the Maine Department of Education’s use of federal funding, according to state records reviewed by The Maine Wire,” Tomic reported.

So before Collins goes off half-cocked on who’s the real partisan on this debate stage, he needs to research his employer’s record of duplicity – the same one whose paychecks he signs has Democrat blood all over it.

Facebook Scorecard:

✓ The Maine Wire – 150,000 followers

✓ Portland Press Herald – 93,000 followers