There’s been a lot of discussion about our signs that say “Vote Troy Jackson — Defund the Police.”
We’re very thankful for that — many, many more County voters and Mainers know about Democrat Senate President Jackson’s ties to a Defund the Police group, including calling the group his “strongest ally.”
While regular Mainers seem to understand the situation, the Maine media appears to be quite confused. Much of the media coverage has been inaccurate or hopelessly slanted (as much as we appreciate the media telling Mainers about their Senate President’s tight relationship with Team Defund the Police).
We want to make sure people have the facts.
1. Troy Jackson called a Defund the Police group his “strongest ally.” That means he’s accepting their support and supporting them. It’s impossible to divorce Jackson’s efforts from this group’s efforts. The group’s page linked just above is dedicated to Maine with a graphic that glorifies their relationship with Senator Jackson.
2. This Defund the Police group advocated for legislation that would defund police, as Virginia news reports confirm.
3. This Defund the Police group, then-called Future Now Fund, spent about $200,000 funding Maine Democrat candidates in elections.
4. These signs had Maine Republican Party disclaimers on them. We were not hiding where they came from.
5. The initial news report from the Press Herald was a hit piece. It was intentionally written in a misleading way. The Press Herald ignored the evidence (see points 1 and 2) and ultimately misled its readers.
6. Other print and TV Maine news outlets followed the Press Herald’s inaccurate lead.
In short: it is absolutely accurate to tie Troy Jackson to Defund the Police groups.
By and large, Maine press got it wrong.
Yesterday, Maine GOP went on the WGAN Morning News to discuss Jackson’s ties to the Defund the Police group. Reporters who parroted the Press Herald’s inaccurate coverage may want to listen — they’ll likely learn some facts that they didn’t pick up from the early inaccurate reports.
Sadly, this episode gives Mainers another reason to be skeptical of political press coverage. As the news website Axios noted, trust in media is now at historic lows. The percentage of Americans who say they have “a great deal” or “quite a lot” of confidence in newspapers and television news is down to 16 and 11 percent respectively. That’s not an accident — episodes like this are the reason for Americans losing trust in media.
We look forward to a flood of corrections from the Press Herald, Bangor Daily News, NewsCenter, WGME, and all the others who parroted the Press Herald’s mistakes. And again, thank you to the statewide print, tv, and radio outlets who helped us to tell Troy Jackson’s constituents and Mainers statewide about his ties to this Defund the Police group.
PS: A number of other left-wing, Maine-Democrat-supporting advocacy organizations like Maine People’s Alliance, Maine Equal Justice Partners, Planned Parenthood, Sierra Club, and NARAL specifically advocated for Defunding the Police, so this discussion will continue.
