Sometimes the centrist position is to say that the menu itself is inadequate.

CIVPAC is not endorsing in the Maine Senate race at this time.

That is not because the race is unimportant. It is very important. Maine could help determine control of the United States Senate. Susan Collins is one of the few remaining Republican senators with a reputation for independence. Graham Platner, the Democratic nominee, has become an embattled and highly controversial candidate. Even apart from the personal controversies, his policy positions make a centrist uneasy. And the possible Democratic replacements, if Platner withdraws, do not yet present an obvious centrist alternative.

That is precisely the problem.

This race poses a real dilemma for centrists. On ordinary policy and temperament grounds, many centrists may find Susan Collins preferable to the current Democratic field. She is experienced, institutionally minded, and comparatively moderate within the modern Republican Party. She has sometimes broken with Donald Trump in ways that matter.

But “comparatively moderate” is not the same as independent of today’s Republican Party. A vote for Collins is also a vote that affects Senate control, committee control, confirmations, and the ability of Congress to restrain or enable a Trump-dominated Republican Party. PolitiFact found that Collins voted with Trump’s position 94.6% of the time in 2025, while also noting that she was still among the less Trump-aligned Republican senators. Both halves of that sentence matter.

The Democratic side is not easier. Platner won the Democratic nomination, despite CIVPAC’s preference for Janet Mills in the primary, but he now faces serious allegations and controversies, which he denies, and major Democratic leaders have called on him to withdraw. Senate Democratic leaders have said the DSCC will not invest in the Maine race if he remains on the ballot. Maine Democrats have said that if Platner withdraws, he cannot choose his replacement; the state party would do so under Maine’s replacement process.

Legally, Platner cannot name his replacement. Politically, that is not the end of the matter. He is under no legal obligation to withdraw, and that gives him cards to play. If he tries to condition his withdrawal on influence over the replacement, I am not persuaded that the Maine Democratic Party will have the will to call his bluff. If it capitulates — especially to a successor in Platner’s ideological lane — it will likely lose a majority of the centrist independent vote.

That replacement process may produce a better nominee. It may not.

The names being discussed include figures with experience and ability. Janet Mills is a sitting governor and a conventional governing Democrat. Nirav Shah has a technocratic public-health and administrative profile. Troy Jackson has appeal to working-class populists. Shenna Bellows has experience in state office and a strong democracy/civil-liberties profile. But none of these alternatives, at least at this stage, clearly solves the centrist problem.

Mills may be the most conventionally centrist Democrat. Shah may be the most technocratic. Jackson and Bellows appeal more strongly to progressive voters, which is precisely why they do not clearly solve the problem from a centrist’s point of view. But “less bad” or “more plausible” is not the same as meeting an affirmative standard for endorsement.

That distinction matters to CIVPAC.

Our endorsements are not meant to be automatic partisan gestures. We do not endorse Democrats simply because of our concerns about Trump’s Republican Party. We do not endorse Republicans simply because a Democratic nominee is too far left. We are looking for candidates who show moderation, seriousness, judgment, respect for democratic institutions, and a willingness to govern rather than perform.

Sometimes a race does not offer that choice.

That is not merely a Maine problem. It is a system problem.

America’s winner-take-all elections push politics into two major parties. In normal times, that can be frustrating. In abnormal times, it can become dangerous. Voters are forced to weigh questions that should not have to be bundled together. Do I prefer this candidate’s policy instincts? Do I prefer the other party’s control of the Senate? Do I trust this person’s character? Do I trust that person’s party? Am I voting for a senator, a Senate majority, a check on a president, or a message to my own side?

The answer, too often, is all of the above.

That is why many centrists feel politically homeless. They may prefer Susan Collins to much of the Democratic field on temperament and some policy questions. They may also fear strengthening a Republican Senate in the Trump era. They may want Democrats to nominate serious, mainstream, pro-democracy candidates. They may also be unwilling to reward a party that elevates candidates who are unvetted, extreme, or unfit. They may want a politics of moderation, but find themselves offered a choice between party control and candidate quality.

That is not a healthy political system.

CIVPAC believes voters deserve better than this. They deserve serious candidates in both parties. They deserve primaries that test judgment, not merely ideological enthusiasm. They deserve parties that vet candidates before crisis. They deserve institutions that make room for independent-minded voters without forcing them into binary choices that distort their actual views.

The Maine Senate race is a reminder that centrism is not the same thing as splitting the difference. Sometimes the centrist position is not to “endorse the moderate Republican” or “endorse the least objectionable Democrat.” Sometimes the centrist position is to say that the menu itself is inadequate.

That is where CIVPAC is today.

We may revisit the race if the field changes. If Platner withdraws and Maine Democrats choose a replacement who demonstrates moderation, seriousness, judgment, and respect for democratic institutions, that candidate deserves evaluation. If Collins takes positions or actions that demonstrate genuine independence from Trumpism, that matters too. But at this point, CIVPAC is not prepared to endorse anyone.

That may sound unsatisfying. It is unsatisfying.

But honesty is better than pretending.

The Maine Senate race presents exactly the kind of dilemma that makes many Americans distrust politics: a comparatively moderate Republican tied to a party many centrists believe has become dangerous, and a Democratic field that has not yet produced a clearly acceptable alternative.

That is not a reason to stop caring. It is a reason to demand better.

Update: Shortly after this post was published, Graham Platner announced that he was suspending his campaign. That does not eliminate the dilemma described below; it moves it to the replacement process. The central question now is whether Maine Democrats will choose a nominee who can appeal to centrist and independent voters, or whether they will remain in Platner’s ideological lane.

If the replacement is chosen through a rushed activist convention, Democrats may have avoided letting Platner name his successor while still creating a process likely to favor his faction. That may prove to be all the capitulation he needed.