Maine governor leaves profanity-laced voicemail for Democratic lawmaker

It is not a secret that Maine Gov. Paul LePage has a tendency toward the profane: the second-term governor has, among other things, compared his opponents’ political tactics to “[giving] it to the people without providing Vaseline” and suggested the state’s NAACP chapter could “kiss my butt.”

But he took it to a new level this week when he left a voicemail for a Democratic lawmaker in Maine who he believed had called him a racist. (Rep. Drew Gattine, the lawmaker in question, denied that he had used that term.)

“Mr. Gattine, this is Gov. Paul Richard LePage,” LePage said in an audio recording of the call, first obtained by the Portland Press Herald. “I would like to talk to you about your comments about my being a racist, you (expletive). I want to talk to you. I want you to prove that I’m a racist. I’ve spent my life helping black people and you little son-of-a-b*tch, socialist c***sucker. You … I need you to, just friggin. I want you to record this and make it public because I am after you. Thank you.”

LePage continued his tirade against Gattine in an interview with reporters about the incident, suggesting he would like to “duel” the lawmaker and point his gun “right between the eyes.”

“When a snot-nosed little guy from Westbrook calls me a racist, now I’d like him to come up here because, tell you right now, I wish it were 1825,” he said. “And we would have a duel, that’s how angry I am, and I would not put my gun in the air, I guarantee you, I would not be (Alexander) Hamilton. I would point it right between his eyes, because he is a snot-nosed little runt and he has not done a damn thing since he’s been in this Legislature to help move the state forward.”

Gattine chairs the Maine State House Health and Services Committee, and the dust-up was over comments LePage had made about the racial composition of drug trafficking suspects in the state. He told the Portland Press Herald that LePage’s language was “upsetting, inappropriate and uncalled for.”

Gattine has called for LePage to receive counseling, telling reporters that this is not the first time LePage has crossed a line.

“Every time you think the governor’s crossed the line, he sets another line and crosses it again. I mean, it is—we all know that Maine’s a wonderful place full of wonderful people, and it’s awful and embarrassing that this is the message and this is what people are seeing about what Maine politics are like. There’s no other politician in Maine, Republican or Democratic or independent ... who would ever do these kinds of things and say these kinds of things.”

In a statement from the governor’s office Friday morning, LePage said he apologized to the people of Maine for the way he worded his comments but makes “no apology for trying to end the drug epidemic that is ravaging our state.”

“When someone calls me a racist, I take it very seriously. I didn’t know Drew Gattine from a hole in the wall until yesterday. It made me enormously angry when a TV reporter asked me for my reaction about Gattine calling me a racist. It is the absolute worst, most vile thing you can call a person. So I called Gattine and used the worst word I could think of,” he said. “I apologize for that to the people of Maine, but I make no apology for trying to end the drug epidemic that is ravaging our state. Legislators like Gattine would rather be politically correct than protect ruthless drug dealers than work with me to stop this crisis that is killing five Mainers a week.”

“When I said I was going after Gattine, I meant I would do everything I could to see that he and his agenda is defeated politically. I am a history buff, and I referenced how political opponents used to call each other out in the 1820s—including Andrew Jackson, the father of the Democratic Party,” LePage continued. “Obviously, it is illegal today; it was simply a metaphor and I meant no physical harm to Gattine. But I am calling him out to stop giving inflammatory sound bites and get to work to end this crisis that is killing Mainers, destroying families and creating drug-addicted babies, all so the drug dealers Gattine is protecting can make a profit.”