Maine state Rep. Valli Geiger, one of Graham Platner’s possible replacements to run for U.S. Senate in his stead, is refusing to condemn the now-withdrawn Democratic nominee accused of sexual assault — despite sponsoring legislation that she designed to hold rapists accountable.
Geiger, a self-described “longtime feminist,” issued a statement on Tuesday declaring that she stands by Platner after his former girlfriend, Jenny Racicot, told Politico that he forced her to have sex with him in 2021 while she repeatedly told him to stop.
“I will not throw Graham under the bus, but neither will I slander or accuse Ms. Racicot of anything more than telling the truth as she experienced it,” Geiger wrote. “I acknowledge the pain on all sides and offer compassion on all sides.”
“Her story seems credible,” Geiger added. “None of us knows the truth nor will we ever.”
Rape kit accountability bill introduced by Geiger
Geiger’s decision to stand by Platner in the wake of the rape allegation appears to be at odds with her legislative work.
In 2024, Geiger sponsored a bill to “increase access to justice for survivors of sexual assault by establishing a statewide sexual assault forensic examination kit tracking system.”
“We are failing in our basic duty to keep the residents of this state safe and to hold those who commit egregious acts of sexual violence accountable,” Geiger said at the time.
Geiger’s still-pending bill, her hallmark legislation, would create an inventory of DNA-collection kits that remain untested in medical facilities and crime labs across Maine, allowing victims of sexual assault to check on the status of their test results and see whether law enforcement was truly following through on investigating rape reports.
This year, Platner invited Geiger to speak about the bill at a Tax the Rich rally that he held in Portland, and Geiger, in turn, credited Platner with helping her to secure funding for the bill, which passed the state legislature but was pocket-vetoed by Gov. Janet Mills (D-ME) due to procedural and budgeting concerns.
While introducing the bill on the Maine House floor, Geiger denounced general “disinclination to believe the victim,” saying that she is a survivor of sexual assault herself. Geiger testified that she was sexually assaulted in college, did not report the incident, and declined to tell anyone for another 15 years.
The Washington Examiner contacted Geiger’s office for comment on why she decided to support Platner, the alleged abuser in this case.
Geiger called into question another woman’s abuse allegations against Platner
Geiger previously cast doubt on another Platner accuser’s story because of the woman’s conservative affiliations. In a June interview on Jake Tapper’s CNN show, Geiger joined fellow Democrats in seeking to discredit Lyndsey Fifield, who said Platner was physically abusive at times when they dated between 2013 and 2015.
Geiger said she found it “a little hard to accept [Fifield’s] word,” asserting that Fifield is “a Republican operative” and had helped write the 2018 speech that incumbent Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) delivered on the Senate floor explaining her vote to confirm Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh.
However, there is no documented evidence that Fifield was ever a speechwriter for Collins, Planter’s GOP opponent, or that she is connected to Collins in any way. Collins told local reporters that she “never” met Fifield nor had “even heard her name” before the senator read the New York Times exposé that aired Fifield’s account, alongside a sanitized version of Racicot’s, though Racicot did not come forward with the rape claims until the Politico piece on Monday.
The narrative that Collins was somehow involved in the initial abusive-behavior story stems from Fifield joking in a group chat with friends, “I will personally go campaign for Collins,” according to a screenshot of the offhand comment she shared with the New York Times. Fifield also co-founded Ladies for Kavanaugh, an informal group assembled in support of Kavanaugh’s nomination.
Fifield is a visiting fellow at Independent Women, a conservative-oriented policy center. However, she has not been active with Independent Women for years, and the last payment to her from the organization came in 2022.
Fifield says she is no longer a registered Republican and does not consider herself one, noting that she has voted for and supported some Democrats since moving to Virginia in 2020.
As for Racicot, whose version of events Geiger decidedly refrained from disputing, the New York Times identified her as a Maine Democrat.
Platner prods Geiger to take his place on the ballot
Ahead of Platner announcing on Wednesday that he is exiting the Senate race, Geiger earlier in the day said he nudged her to succeed him as the party’s nominee.
That afternoon, Geiger told Maine’s Total Coverage that Platner had called her on Monday night to say he would back her run if she so chose.
“He said, ‘Valli, you are a fighter, you have been with this movement since the beginning,’” Geiger recounted.
The Maine Democratic Party will soon hold a roughly 600-member nominating convention to choose Platner’s replacement.
A staff member for the Platner campaign confirmed to Maine’s Total Coverage that Platner did call Geiger this week and encouraged her to consider running.
In his 11-minute withdrawal speech, Platner called for the candidate-selection system to be “open, transparent, and democratic,” adding, “I’m not trying to dictate to anyone who it should be or how we get there.”
An endorsement from Platner and close alignment with him could actually hurt his preferred pick’s chances. Former state Sen. Troy Jackson, who lost last month’s Democratic gubernatorial primary, is another “very, very interested” contender positioning himself as “the best person to replace him.” In polling that Platner’s campaign conducted on Tuesday to see who would have the greatest chance of flipping the Senate seat, Jackson performed best, according to Politico. Jackson, unlike Geiger, has placed distance between himself and Platner, saying outright that he is not seeking his endorsement.
“It’s unfortunate, but I just don’t want it,” Jackson said.
Geiger, a loyal supporter of Platner, has publicly defended him on several occasions as he faced an avalanche of scandals. She argued in an October 2025 op-ed that he “deserves grace” over a series of old, controversial Reddit posts, including one in which Platner said that people worried about being raped should “take some responsibility for themselves and not get so f***ed up they wind up having sex with someone they don’t mean to.”
When news broke of Platner sending sexually explicit texts to other women while he was a married man, Geiger framed Platner, a Marine Corps veteran, as “a wounded warrior.”
“People are flawed and people are messy,” Geiger said in a Facebook statement. “Graham, being a man who has grown up with social media, has his messiness on full display. We can choose him, knowing his struggles, knowing he is in and has been in therapy for years, doing what Carl Jung calls shadow work.”
In the CNN interview, Geiger chalked Platner’s threatening conduct toward Fifield up to being “a lousy boyfriend” during a period of post-traumatic stress following his military service.
Geiger reaffirmed her sympathy for Platner this week, reiterating that he was dealing with combat-related trauma when the alleged rape occurred.
“As a former [Veterans Affairs] nurse, I granted and still grant him an enormous amount of grace for his behavior in the ‘dark years’ when he returned from multiple deployments,” Geiger wrote on Tuesday.
MAINE LAWMAKER SAYS PLATNER URGED HER TO RUN FOR SENATE IF HE STEPPED DOWN
Geiger said she met Platner through an environmental activist.
On a candidate questionnaire, Geiger said she believes climate change “is the existential challenge of our time,” and, opposing the expansion of Maine’s natural-gas infrastructure, Geiger bragged on the Maine House floor about confiscating her husband’s beloved gas stove, replacing their household appliance with an induction cooktop because he developed a chronic cough while sheltering inside during the COVID-19 pandemic. Geiger blamed her husband’s condition on “dirty air” that she claimed was caused by the gas stove.