Coming on the eve of former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's retirement announcement and Election Day, the retirement announcement by Rep. Jared Golden, D-Maine, last week was clearly buried by bigger news.
But the exit of the four-term centrist lawmaker could have a major impact on the 2026 midterm elections. At a time when the House is almost evenly divided (219 Republicans, 214 Democrats, and 2 vacancies), Golden is relinquishing the 2nd District, which Donald Trump carried by ten percentage points last year. The odds of a GOP pickup, then, are high.
Moreover, political observers in the Pine Tree State from both parties agree that the Republican likely to win the seat is Paul LePage — a two-term former governor, more conservative than most Maine Republicans, and by far one of the state’s most bombastic politicians.
One of 18 children who was often beaten by his alcoholic father, LePage grew up with French as his first language and at one point was homeless on the streets of Lewiston.
He went on to earn money as a shoeshine boy and bartender and — the lone member of his family to go beyond the eighth grade — attended high school and college, eventually earning a master’s degree in business administration from the University of Maine. He later worked for a lumber company, became general manager of the retail chain Marden’s, and was elected mayor of Waterville.
As governor, LePage was unusually conservative for a Maine Republican — strongly pro-life, an advocate for repealing the state income tax, and the issuer of a record 642 vetoes.
He was also frequently under fire for off-the-cuff remarks, notably in 2016 when he claimed that drug dealers from New York and Connecticut came to Maine to do business and "half the time they impregnate a young white girl before they leave." LePage’s comment was widely denounced as racist, a charge he strongly denied.
Golden, one of the last remaining Blue Dog (moderate) Democrats in the House, voted against Pelosi for speaker in 2019 and supported President Trump’s tariff agenda.
He was also the lone Democrat to vote to reopen the government when the House enacted a continuing resolution without funding for premium subsidies under the Affordable Care Act — funding Democrats had almost unanimously demanded as a condition for reopening the government.
The former Marine faced a spirited challenge from former Secretary of State Matt Dunlap, who argued that Golden was out of sync with the Democratic Party and pledged to run against him from the left. Upon Golden’s retirement announcement, Dunlap reaffirmed his candidacy and added that 2nd District voters "definitely deserve better than Paul LePage."
"Jared is not the political animal that many times seek this office level and I wish he and his family well," Andre Cushing, onetime colleague of Golden in the state legislature and now president of the Maine County Commissioners Association, told Newsmax.
"The current efforts by progressive elements who are inserting themselves into politics from the municipal level to all types of state and federal levels is disturbing as it ignores the values of many who are looking for level-headed elected officials who will govern without inflicting too much pain or cost to their constituents."
Cushing added, "time will tell how our form of represtative government will fair and what direction we will take, toward more restrictive policies or a return to a freer based society."
John Gizzi is chief political columnist and White House correspondent for Newsmax. For more of his reports, Go Here Now.