|
Beth Edmonds, Democrat, a former Senate President and 4 term legislator of the Baldacci era, is currently starring in Janet Mills' attack ads falsely claiming that Shawn Moody wants to take away her health insurance. A supposed proponent of getting big money out of politics, it is ironic that Edmonds' starring role is at the hands of two super PACs. On the plus side, if any of you have a bridge, looks like Beth Edmonds is happy to sell it for you... 
0 Comments
Did you see Governor LePage's statement?
Governor LePage is appealing his lawsuit against Janet Mills to the Supreme Court. Not only is it concerning that Mills entered into a federal lawsuit without direction from the Legislature or the Governor as required by law, but the Governor points out that we do not know how Janet Mills paid for her work on the federal lawsuit. Janet Mills' rogue behavior is not only concerning, it's just plain shady. See Governor LePage's full statement below: Governor LePage Will Appeal Mills Lawsuit to Supreme Court For Immediate Release: Monday, October 22, 2018 Contact: Julie Rabinowitz, Press Secretary, 207-287-2531 AUGUSTA--Governor Paul R. LePage announced today that he will appeal Friday's decision by Justice Michaela Murphy in his lawsuit asking the asking the Superior Court to find that the Attorney General exceeded her authority by bringing a federal suit in a different state on behalf of the people of Maine without being directed to do so by the Governor or Legislature. "I am suing Attorney General Janet Mills because she has refused to follow the law in representing the Governor's Office, and she has explicitly broken the law by suing the federal government in another state without direction from either the Legislature or the Governor," stated Governor LePage. "The Attorney General acts as if she is her own branch of government instead of a department head subject to the direction of the duly elected Legislature. The Democrats in the Legislature are obviously afraid to rein her in so it is left to me once again to call out rogue and unscrupulous behavior when I see it." The Governor continued, "Furthermore, since she enters into these lawsuits without authorization from the Legislature or the Governor, I question how she is paying for them since there is no appropriation or financial order to cover the expense. Since we cannot obtain a clear record of time and billing from her office, I can only assume that she is covering the costs of these lawsuits with funds that were not appropriated for that purpose. Her rogue behavior, refusal to respect the authority of the Legislature or the Governor of the State of Maine, and lack of transparency around time and money show that she is not a solution for what needs fixing in state government, she is the problem. She represents the cronyism that I've been fighting to clean up for eight years." "Unfortunately, this case has been on Justice Murphy's desk awaiting a decision since May, and it is clear she delayed issuing a ruling--until challenged by my attorneys--so the appeal would not be heard until after the election," added Governor LePage. Justice Murphy's decision states: "Here, the Governor argues that the Attorney General exceeded her authority by participating in a federal action on behalf of the State. The Governor cites to the language of the statute, suggesting not unreasonably that the language is clear and unambiguous." The decision is available here (scroll to bottom of press release web page).
Maine GOP TV Ad Highlights Janet Mills Double-Dipping at Taxpayer Expense
Mills collecting six-figure salary, and state funded pension while running for Governor AUGUSTA – The Maine GOP is rolling out our new 30 second TV ad, ‘Janet Mills, Double-Dipper’ this morning. The ad exposes how Janet Mills, while being paid to work as Attorney General, has been collecting a taxpayer funded Maine retirement check and running for Governor. “This ad speaks for itself,” said Jason Savage, executive director of the Maine GOP. “Janet Mills has been collecting two taxpayer funded paychecks while running for Governor. Whether it’s chips, dips, or the public payroll, double-dipping is never good. Two paychecks, one job, all while running for Governor. Janet Mills is why Maine’s tired of career politicians.” The New York Times’ desperate smear attempt on Shawn Moody is so fundamentally flawed that Maine’s press wouldn’t even touch it when Janet Mills’ national attack squad shopped it around.
This is nothing but an attempt by America’s most famous fake news outlet to attack and smear a good man and great company for partisan political gain. The New York Times was offered a list of women who work at Moody’s. Many have children, were pregnant when they worked at Moody's, or are pregnant now. The report is FALSE. This attempt to smear one of Maine’s Best Places To Work with a hack article is all about nationalizing a race already swamped with millions of dollars in liberal outside money. There is no shame with the national media – especially the New York Times. Below is a statement from the Moody Campaign on this desperate New York Times smear: BREAKING: New York Times prints false allegations against Moody which have existed in public file since 2006 · Out-of-State paper seeks to harm Moody’s reputation close to election day · In video Moody co-workers come to his defense · Moody’s has regularly won one of “Maine’s Best Places to Work” from outside ratings organization with high ratings from women and men who work for the company GORHAM – Now that the race for Governor is in October and the election is just weeks away, the New York Times is seeking to interject itself into Maine’s race for Governor by publishing a piece seeking to attack the reputation of Shawn Moody. The false allegations against Moody have existed in a public file since 2006, prior to Moody’s first race for Governor. Despite thorough research into Moody’s background and a full examination by the Maine media for many years, the New York Times is now seeking to discredit him. Democratic Party operatives and allies have sought to spread the story for months knowing Moody was, and is, in a strong position to win. “Let me just say this, and in the strongest way possible, I have always treated every co-worker employee with dignity and respect, always,” said entrepreneur Shawn Moody. “It is just outrageous to even suggest my business does not have opportunities for women.” In relation to the false allegation attack, several women at Moody’s have joined together in defending Shawn Moody and the company. The interview videos contain several short clips where they outline their personal feelings and experiences. Debbie Gale who has worked with Moody for twenty years, including during the time the fired employee was at Moody’s, talks of the false allegations and how women have always been treated the company. She states, “It’s crazy, it’s not who Shawn is as a person.” Adding, “It’s ridiculous. It’s not true...women are respected here, men are respected here. If someone is no longer here it is because they have not done their job,” said Gale in some of the many statements contained in the video. Moody’s coworker Carrie White, a mother of three and multi-year Moody’s coworker, discusses her own experiences and thoughts on the allegation. Single mother Tameka Dexter also notes Shawn’s approach at the company and opportunities for women at the company. HD Videos can be viewed here: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/x7db9bp8c7qfwz7/AACLL-oQbzABACuJsRL9cBaka?dl=0 The false allegations were made by a former coworker let go by Moody’s back in 2006, twelve years ago. The former coworker, who hired an attorney and took financial gain, falsely alleged that Mr. Moody and the company fired her due to motherhood; despite the fact that Moody’s employed other women, continues to employ women at a higher rate than the industry average, and that the majority of Moody’s women coworkers have children. Several women have given birth during their employment as a co-worker at the company and others are pregnant now. At the time Moody’s company insurance carrier stepped in under the insurance agreement to pay the legal bills surrounding the case and to deal with the attorneys. On their recommendation Moody’s settled the case, as noted in public documents at the Maine Human Rights Commission, in an effort to reduce legal fees from a long fight and move on from the former, terminated, coworker. In 40+ of business, it was and is the only time a fired coworker issued an allegation. Moody’s has a process where several people within the company are involved in both the hiring and firing process. A few facts: In the Moody’s 2018 Best Places to Work award process, staff surveys sent to Moody’s following the outside ratings review, indicated women employees gave Moody’s a 96% satisfaction rate. As part of Moody’s company health plan coverage for co-workers preventative care includes: childhood immunizations and breast, cervical or colorectal cancer screenings. In the year 2017 (through December 31), women at Moody’s had a median wage of $51,805 while the national average is $39,988 – https://www.thebalancecareers.com/average-salary-information-for-us-workers-2060808 According to a demographic report from Deloitte, MIT Media Lab and partners; people holding technical degrees and choosing to work in Moody’s industry nationally are 92.9% male. https://datausa.io/profile/cip/470603/#demographics The federal Bureau of Labor Statistics, in a larger similar category, reports nationally 9.6% as the percentage of women working in this given field, meaning men make up over 90% of workers nationally. https://www.bls.gov/cps/cpsaat18.htm Moody’s currently employs more women at their business than the national average. Women work in all facets of the business, including as a technicians on the shop floors. Currently twenty five women work at Moody’s, with six in leadership positions. Eighteen of these women have children and family responsibilities. Four of these women were pregnant and gave birth while employed by Moody’s or are pregnant today. “It is truly sad that the New York Times would seek to paint this picture, with a fired coworker and her family, and try to harm Shawn Moody and his business just because he chose to run for Governor,” said Lauren LePage, Campaign Manager for Moody. District 19, which covers part of Sanford and Springvale incumbent Representative Matt Harrington is facing challenger Jeremy Mele. Who is Jeremy Mele? While Mele is the Democrat candidate, he is in fact a Socialist and previously held the position of Vice Chair of the Southern Maine Democratic Socialists of America. Currently, he is the head of the York County Regional Democratic Socialists of America. Mele was raised in Quincy, Massachusetts and obtained two Undergraduate Degrees from Salem State University. He studies philosophy at Brandeis University in Waltham Massachusetts, and with that education believes he can take his philosophy studies and use them to influence policy in local government. He unsuccessfully ran for Sanford City Council in 2016. A notable piece of Mele’s work during his time at Salem State was his thesis, in the form of a dramatic play in which the main character “Geoffrey—in a Twilight Zone-esque twist—is granted the ability to kill the bigoted politicians that plague his well-being and his TV screen with his mind.” Continuing in the abstract, Mele writes, “All I can say is this; right or wrong, writing the death of a Donald Trump analogue was a fairly cathartic experience.” Mele lists a number of issues which are important to him, issues such as the opioid epidemic, healthcare, and workers rights, yet his career as a student, and his lack of first hand experience with healthcare, as he admits to being on his father's plan, seems to leave him unprepared to tackle these complex issues facing real Maine communities. Please help get the word out to your friends who Jeremy Mele really is. We need to ensure that Matt Harrington is re-elected this November.  Jeremy Mele poses with infamous print of murderous Communist Dictator Ernesto "Che" Guevara.
 Jared Golden voted against allowing Mainers to buy cheaper electricity from hydro power.
On a bill in 2015, Jared Golden opposed a state law that would have helped Mainers save money by labeling hydro power a renewable energy and lowering the cost of electricity bills by adding it to Maine's renewable portfolio. So while other states and Canada have access to plenty of clean, low cost hydro power, Mainers are stuck with rising electricity bills. Next time you open your electric bill, take a moment to ask yourself if you want Jared Golden voting on national energy policy.  Did you know that Janet Mills once sponsored a bill to give $800,000 in taxpayer cash to her friends who said they wanted to make a film in Maine? Well she did!
As we know, one of the most important things a Governor does is balance the state budget and save money for a rainy day. In 2008, however, as a rainy day was approaching, Janet Mills was trying to “make it rain cash” on her filmmaker friends instead of saving state tax dollars for the most important needs of the state. Incidentally, despite Janet Mills' attempt to fork over $800k of your money in four $200k yearly installments to her filmmaker friends, they went and made the movie somewhere else. And the movie ended up only making $135k in the domestic box office. Janet Mills sure knows how to pick 'em. BACKGROUND: KENNEBEC JOURNAL April 15, 2008 Byline: Susan Cover "Rep. Janet Mills, D-Farmington, sponsored legislation that would reimburse up to $800,000 in expenses for the movie production. The payments would begin in July 2010, and continue for four years up to $200,000 a year.: - Legislation: LD 2319, 123rd Maine Legislature  It may feel like it's been forever, but not too long ago Mainers had to go to classes, fill out paperwork, and jump through other hoops to get permission to exercise their constitutional right to carry a firearm. Effort after effort failed to pass Constitutional Carry, and even when it recently passed, Jared Golden voted against it three times! Add to that Jared Golden's "D" rating from the NRA, and the picture becomes very clear. We don't need someone like Jared who will oppose our Second Amendment rights and the Maine Constitution. GOLDEN'S COMMS OFFICE TOLD MEDIA 'ABSOLUTELY NO TRUTH' TO INAPPROPRIATE CONDUCT ALLEGATIONS AGAINST DILLON BATES
GOLDEN HAS YET TO COMMENT, PROMPTING QUESTIONS AUGUSTA - A WMTW report on the Dillon Bates story accusing him of inappropriate conduct and relationships with teenage high school girls shows that Democrat leadership was flatly denying there was any truth to the story this spring. The story quotes a Democrat communications staffer, who no longer lives in Maine, saying this spring there was “absolutely no truth” at all to the story. Speaker Sara Gideon, however, is now claiming that she had heard the rumors months ago and told Rep. Bates he would be asked to resign if any more information came to light . Only now, after an article was published on Rep. Bates’ alleged behavior, is Speaker Gideon calling for his resignation. House Democrats have only two communications staff positions. A simple deduction shows the staffer quoted was Lindsay Crete, the communications director for Jared Golden's office, as can be seen on this page, last archived from December, 2017. http://web.archive.org/web/20171221125907/https://legislature.maine.gov/housedems/Welcome.htm Crete is the only communications staffer who no longer works in the office and no longer works in Maine. So while Speaker Gideon is now speaking to the matter, it was Jared Golden's communications director who told WMTW there was “absolutely no truth” to the story. While Speaker Gideon has called on Rep. Dillon Bates to resign, Jared Golden appears to be avoiding comment. Jared Golden is seeking a seat in Congress, where an epidemic of misconduct and worse has been exposed and laws have been passed to try to crack down on the epidemic. Who instructed Golden's communications director to tell reporters there was “absolutely no truth” to this story if Speaker Gideon had warned Bates he would be asked to resign if any more came to light? Please note: the only real difference between the story published at the Bollard and the allegations that circulated through the state house earlier this year is that the accusations are now in the media spotlight. Only when it became a political risk for Jared Golden, Sara Gideon and Democrats, did Speaker Gideon say Dillon Bates had to go. We still don't know what Jared Golden thinks, except his communications director said there was "absolutely no truth" to the accusations. There is no way around it, something stinks. We are reiterating our call for someone to get to the bottom of this. We call on Jared Golden to step forward and explain how his communications office's story is so different than the story told Friday by Speaker Sara Gideon and her staff. Did Jared Golden instruct his communications staffer to say there was absolutely no proof to the allegations? What did Jared Golden know, and when did he know it? - Inaccuracies from Mills camp were reported without verification,leading to coverage that largely and inaccurately favored Mills
- This must serve as a cautionary lesson to reporters to independently verify information, not just parrot Mills campaign talking points AUGUSTA – The Maine Republican Party is setting the record straight on recent reporting that provided a much more favorable narrative for the Mills for Governor campaign. Misleading statements from the Mills campaign were repeated with no verification by the media. The following are three glaring examples of a job not well done: TOTAL RAISED On total dollars raised, Janet Mills' campaign for Governor released a statement to the media that portrayed far more favorable results than were true: Mills' campaign claimed the candidate had raised $1,052,584.67 to-date in the race for Governor. TRUTH: Mills' campaign raised $1,032, 605.76 and had counted in a campaign loan as funds raised, although they are listed separately on the report. The media reported the larger number, which allowed them to claim the Mills campaign had raised about $14,000 MORE than the Moody campaign, when the reports themselves show the Mills campaign had raised about $6,000 LESS than Moody. Had reporters worked to verify the statement from the Mills campaign, instead of just taking their word for it, reports such as these would have been very different: “Mills, the attorney general, raised just over $1.05 million through July 17, according to her latest filings with the Maine Ethics Commission. That was just ahead of Moody, a businessman whoraised just under $1.04 million in both the primary and general election campaigns combined.” - Bangor Daily News “Campaign finance figures released Tuesday night show Democratic Attorney General Janet Mills edging out her Republican opponent, businessman Shawn Moody, by less than $20,000.” - Portland Press Herald CASH ON HAND The Mills campaign originally reported they had $212,596 “cash on hand” when they actually had only $206,546 cash on hand. However, the original amount was reported, and even as of the writing of this statement, the original “cash on hand” amount reported by Mills remains in at least one news article: https://www.pressherald.com/2018/07/24/independents-report-more-than-1-5-million-in-contributions-in-bids-for-blaine-house/ “While the Mills campaign said a “software issue” prevented it from posting the full reports on the Maine ethics commission website Tuesday night, the campaign reported raising $1,052,585 as of July 17 and ending the most recent reporting period with $212,596 in available cash.” - Portland Press Herald IN-STATE VS OUT-OF-STATE The Mills campaign also got away with a pretty big spin line about Mills support from in-state vs out-of-state donors, saying in both the original and updated statements from the Mills campaign: “Additionally, nearly 80 percent of the total money raised has been from Maine...” along with a lengthy quote from the campaign about support from “thousands of Mainers.” The Bangor Daily News accurately provided context that the Moody campaign reported more than 97% of donors were from Maine. A dramatically higher number than Mills, but fair in providing the complete picture of the race. The Portland Press Herald, however, did not cover the actual numbers and instead provided the full quote the Mills camp provided and followed it up by saying that the Moody campaign “did not immediately comment on the finance reports,” even though the online PPH article shows it was updated Thursday and the Moody campaign statement was issued early Wednesday morning. Maine Republican Party Communications Director, Nina McLaughlin, weighed in,“We need to caution the press to verify the statements from the Mills campaign before publishing them. "Janet Mills was allowed to claim she raised more money than Shawn Moody when she did not. She was allowed to present herself as having very strong in-state support from donors when she actually has raised a lower percentage of her money from Maine donors than any of the four well-funded candidates for Governor, and she was allowed to overstate her cash on hand amount significantly. “All this was supposedly because her campaign reported having a software issue. What a shame.” JANET MILLS HAS TRACK RECORD OF MISLEADING THE PRESS Mills was caught lying in television ads in the primary, claiming Governor LePage had tried to take healthcare away from children, using a photo of a young child in television ads, when the issue she was discussing was actually about able-bodied adults. Mills was also caught lying to the press by saying she had never raised money with disgraced New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman shortly before a flyer of a Mills fundraiser with Schneiderman was discovered and released by the Howie Carr Show. |
Categories
All
Archives
October 2018
|
-
About
- Contact
- Job Openings
- Our Elected Officials >
-
County Committees
>
- Androscoggin County GOP
- Aroostook County GOP
- Cumberland County GOP
- Franklin County GOP
- Hancock County GOP
- Kennebec County GOP
- Knox County GOP
- Lincoln County GOP
- Oxford County GOP
- Penobscot County GOP
- Piscataquis County GOP
- Sagadahoc County GOP
- Somerset County GOP
- Waldo County GOP
- Washington County GOP
- York County GOP
- History of the GOP
- Our Party Leadership
- 2018 MEGOP Draft Platform
- Our Platform
- Our Staff
- State Committee
- Rules and By Laws
- Town Committee Update
- 2016 Presidential Caucus
- Calendar
- News
- #TeamMaine
- 2018
- Donate
- Super Saturday
- Getting To Know You: The Candidates
- Request Your Absentee Ballot Today
RSS Feed