GOP lawmaker warns of ‘dangerous’ ‘California agenda’ turning Maine into liberal bastion

A Maine Republican state senator told Fox News Digital this week progressives in the historically purple state are pushing a “radical” agenda with recent legislation in an attempt to turn Maine into California. He pointed to the decision to remove former President Trump from the ballot as an example of how the state has gone overboard attacking democracy.

Maine GOP State Rep. Billy Bob Faulkingham and State Sen. Trey Stewart issued a response to Democratic Gov. Janet Mills this week, warning that Democrats in the state have embraced a “California agenda” and pointed to several examples where they say Democrats are moving the state in a direction most voters don’t want. 

Trey Stewart spoke to Fox News Digital after the speech and said, “Maine appears to be in a race to the bottom under Democrat leadership and really rivaling some of the historically liberal states on the West Coast” while “trying to jockey for worst state in the country.”

Stewart pointed to energy policy as a prime example.

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Maine lawmaker fears California policies are taking over (Fox News)

“You’ve seen Democrats really kowtowing and bowing down to the special interest groups, namely in the solar and wind lobby, doing basically whatever they want to do at the expense of Maine ratepayers,” Stewart said. 

“And so that’s why you’re seeing some of the highest electricity prices in the country, right here in Maine, when they don’t have to be. You’re also seeing really radical and crazy proposals coming out of August, including bans on things like plastics. We made a lot of national headlines with an electric vehicle mandate to say that we are going to go to 40% all electric vehicle fleet in one of the coldest states in the country, which is rural and spread out, by 2030.

“It’s completely unrealistic. As we know, these vehicles will not do well up here when you’ve got ten feet of snow and it’s minus ten degrees outside. Your battery power isn’t going to be able to get you where you need to go, and so forcing these choices on Maine consumers is absolutely ridiculous and is, frankly, pretty dangerous, actually.”

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Additionally, Stewart said parental rights are under attack in Maine and pointed to a recent bill that was killed in the state legislature that Republicans say was essentially a promotion of “sex trafficking” and “sex tourism” because they say it would have endangered children.

Stewart says the bill, LD 1735, would have allowed “for a non-parental custodian to take a child in Maine for the purposes of sex change, surgery and other procedures, without the parents’ consent.” 

“It was a carryover bill from last year, garnered a ton of national headlines and opposition and, thankfully, because of that, I believe, we were able to push back in committee on that and put a spotlight on it,” Stewart said. “And so much so that the Democrats agreed with us to kill the bill in committee. Now, that doesn’t mean this is over, not by a long shot.”

Maine State House (Staff photo by Ben McCanna/Portland Press Herald via Getty Images)

In late December, Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows, a Democrat, ruled that Trump was barred from running for president in her state because he allegedly “engaged in insurrection” through his actions leading up to and during the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol. 

Stewart told Fox News Digital that decision is out of step with where most Mainers are, in both parties, and has been opposed by most of the top politicians in the state.

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“Look, whether you like the guy or you don’t like the guy, that’s not the way that you beat him,” Stewart said. “If folks have an issue with Donald Trump, we live in a democratic society. You’re allowed to voice that opinion at the polls this November. You can make that choice to do something different, and that’s fine. That’s up to the people to decide. We will respect it. We will honor that decision. What’s not fine is to basically run a kangaroo court, which is what happened.“

Stewart added that the move contradicts Democrats’ claims that they are protecting democracy and “flies in the face of a lot of the taglines and the talking points that the left has been clamoring about for the last few years here, and really is completely, a backwards way of approaching this situation.”

Maine State. Sen. Trey Stewart (Fox News Digital)

“The left is hypocritical all the time. They claim to care about low-income folks, and then they raise their heating bill,” Stewart said. “You know, they claim to care about folks in generational poverty, and then they pass policies that make it even harder. They claim to care about democracy, and then they try to rig an election. You can’t make this stuff up. It doesn’t pass a straight face test. I know that Maine people are buying it. I know that people around the country are buying it.”

Stewart told Fox News Digital that Maine is “not really a blue state” but more a purple state that fluctuates between who is in power every few years but has been under Democrat control recently and the decisions made have “rubbed a lot of folks the wrong way.“

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“They really want to push the envelope as much as they can, and, like I said, they’re vying for the title of, you know, most liberal in the country and pushing their agenda as far as they possibly can, which is only going to hurt Maine people and, in fact, the rest of the country as well,” Stewart said. 

“So, it’s really important that we win. Common sense can rule the day here. It all happens this November.”

Fox News Digital reached out to the Maine Democratic Party for comment but did not receive a response.