Bobby Charles is Ruining Maine. Download and share his report card.

Attacked Health Care for Mainers
Supports Taking Food from Maine Families
Supports Raising Energy Bills for Mainers
Wants to Bring DOGE's Chaos and Stupidity to Maine
Holds Extreme Anti-Abortion Views
Mocks LGBTQ+ Mainers and Spreads a Debunked Hoax
Spreads Election Fraud Conspiracy Theories
Holds Extreme Immigration Positions
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Maine Report Card

Attacked Health Care for Mainers

We all want to be able to take our kids to the doctor and afford our prescriptions without going broke.

Bobby Charles cheered on a plan that rips that security away from tens of thousands of Mainers.

On July 3, 2025, Bobby Charles congratulated Trump on passing the "One Big Beautiful Bill," calling it "a landmark win for the American people." Nonpartisan estimates put the plan on track to leave at least 17 million Americans without health coverage. In Maine, the Joint Economic Committee calculated the bill would cost more than 57,300 Mainers their coverage by 2034 - including 34,700 who would lose Medicaid.
The bill he celebrated imposes Medicaid work requirements that the Congressional Budget Office scored as the single largest source of Medicaid savings - $326 billion, a paperwork maze that had already cost 18,000 people their coverage when Arkansas tried it. The bill also added so much to the national debt that CBO warned it could force nearly $500 billion in automatic Medicare cuts.

Bobby Charles cheered on ripping health care away from tens of thousands of Mainers. We deserve better.

Supports Taking Food from Maine Families

No family in Maine should have to wonder whether there will be enough food on the table. More than 78,000 Maine households rely on SNAP to get by.

Bobby Charles congratulated Trump on passing the "One Big Beautiful Bill," which cut federal SNAP funding by $186 billion through 2034 - roughly 20 percent, and the largest cut to SNAP in history.

Bobby Charles supported making food harder to afford for Maine families. We deserve better.

Supports Raising Energy Bills for Mainers

We all pay the electric bill, and Maine families already pay some of the highest energy costs in the country.

Bobby Charles endorsed legislation that would push those bills even higher - to help pay for tax cuts for the wealthy.

Bobby Charles publicly celebrated the "One Big Beautiful Bill," which slashed clean energy tax credits. Energy Innovation forecast that the phase-out would shrink Maine's electricity generation capacity and raise power prices for consumers, and the Center for American Progress found it put 4,493 Maine jobs and $5.3 billion in investment at risk while adding $723 a year to the average household's gasoline bill by 2035.

Bobby Charles backed higher energy bills in Maine to pay for tax cuts for the wealthy. We deserve better.

Wants to Bring DOGE's Chaos and Stupidity to Maine

We all want a government that works as efficiently as possible for the people who depend on it. Maine is home to 12,700 federal workers and 375,793 Social Security recipients.

While DOGE took a chainsaw to the services they rely on, Bobby Charles was writing that Maine should build one of its own.

In July 2025, Charles wrote that "every state - starting with Maine - should have a 'department of government efficiency' or DOGE", a permanent oversight agency he called "another reason you find me running for Governor." He had already told Mainers that "if you liked the first 90 days of Trump ... you would love the first few weeks of my administration."
Maine was already absorbing the federal version. DOGE-era cuts hit the Social Security Administration's ability to serve seniors. The Trump administration froze roughly $3 million in environmental grants to Maine organizations including the Penobscot Nation and the Gulf of Maine Research Institute, and fired eight workers at Acadia National Park - about 10% of its year-round staff. Charles' own plan is to abolish the state income tax and "slash unnecessary regulation."
Like DOGE, Charles justifies his cuts with numbers that don't hold up. He told NEWS CENTER Maine he wants to "cut spending dramatically," blaming budget growth on "free housing for 8,000 illegal aliens" and MaineCare fraud he claimed ran "as high as hundreds of millions of dollars." Pressed for a source on the 8,000 figure, he said he'd "have to go back and look. But you can find it online." Maine's Medicaid Fraud Control Unit actually recovered $348,515 in 2025. The income tax he would abolish supplies 47.6% of the state's general fund revenue.

Bobby Charles wants to bring DOGE's chaos to Maine. We deserve better.

Holds Extreme Anti-Abortion Views

Decisions about pregnancy should be made by a woman, her family, and her doctor - not by politicians. Maine enacted a law in 2023 protecting that freedom.

Bobby Charles calls himself "unapologetically pro-life," calls abortion "abhorrent," and backs the Supreme Court decision that ended the constitutional right to abortion.

At an October 2025 Maine GOP gubernatorial forum, Charles declared himself "unapologetically pro-life."
He objects to the 2023 Maine law permitting abortion after fetal viability when a doctor finds it medically necessary, and to MaineCare's public funding of abortion. "In my personal view, abortion is abhorrent," he said. Of the ruling that ended the constitutional right to abortion: "Dobbs, I think, was a good decision. I would look at what the legislature gives me."

Bobby Charles wants politicians, not Mainers, deciding their most personal choices. We deserve better.

Mocks LGBTQ+ Mainers and Spreads a Debunked Hoax

Every Maine kid deserves to go to school without being turned into a punchline by the person running to lead the state.

Bobby Charles has spent his campaign mocking transgender students and reviving a hoax that school officials debunked years ago.

In a May 2026 interview with the Christian Civic League of Maine, Charles said "You've got kids now that apparently think that they're cats and dogs, and we are accommodating that. Garbage." He went on: "What do you do, by the way, when you get to be 20, and you break it to them? Actually, you're not a cat, and you will have to go to work and going to not do this kitty litter crap anymore?" There is no evidence any school has ever provided litter boxes to students who identify as animals - the claim has been debunked repeatedly by school districts, journalists, and fact-checkers.
The hoax Charles repeated is not harmless. Education Week found it was "unfairly and inaccurately used to ostracize LGBTQ students" while forcing school leaders to burn time and resources knocking it down.
In the same interview, Charles offered scripture as his evidence that transgender people don't exist: "Noah didn't take 27 genders of animals. He just took two as far as I remember... There's only one God and he makes male and female and that's the way that will always work." He also likened gender dysphoria to claustrophobia, agoraphobia, and a fear of snakes - a view rejected by the American Medical Association, the Endocrine Society, and the American Academy of Pediatrics, all of which support gender-affirming care for minors.
Charles promised to sign an executive order on his first day as governor targeting schools that support students socially transitioning, boasting "I'm going to make Donald Trump, who I like, look slow." He was speaking to a friendly audience: the Christian Civic League of Maine has lobbied for a "Biblical approach" to state government and has pushed to ban gender-affirming care for young people while keeping conversion therapy legal.

Bobby Charles is running a campaign that treats LGBTQ+ Mainers and their kids as a punchline. We deserve better.

Spreads Election Fraud Conspiracy Theories

Our democracy only works when we can trust the results and have faith in each other's votes.

Bobby Charles spread baseless conspiracy theories about Maine's elections.

In an August 2025 column, Charles claimed Maine's voting process was battered by "proven allegations of double voter cards, illegals with driver's licenses and permits", accused Democrats of an "attempt to legalize voting by illegal aliens," and wrote that the voter ID referendum had been "fraudulently interfered with by the shameless Mills Mafia."
He urged Mainers to "send a message to the corrupt Democrat Machine in Augusta" by voting for voter ID. They didn't: Question 1 failed 63.9% to 36.1%, losing in Portland and in rural western Maine alike.

Bobby Charles peddled election conspiracy theories that undermine faith in Maine's democracy. We deserve better.

Holds Extreme Immigration Positions

We all want a border that's safe and orderly, and we want the people who come here treated with basic human decency.

Bobby Charles wants Maine to build its own version of Florida's Everglades detention camp, and has embraced policies that are already hurting Maine.

Charles tweeted "Kudos to @RonDeSantis for Alligator Alcatraz. We need our own version in Maine. Any ideas on names?" - then launched a petition headlined "MAINE SHOULD OPEN ITS OWN ALLIGATOR ALCATRAZ." A federal judge ordered the Florida camp wound down for skipping a required environmental review, but an appeals court put that order on hold within two weeks and in April 2026 threw it out entirely, holding the camp is Florida's to run. Two months later Florida shut it down anyway — less than a year after it opened, every detainee moved out and the tents torn down. The model Charles wants to copy cost $1.2 billion, or $3,571 per detainee per day — roughly 22 times the going rate at other ICE facilities — and Florida taxpayers have been paid back less than 5% of it.
In December 2025, Charles attacked Governor Mills for offering health care to "'pregnant people' and illegals," pledging that as Governor "we will work with President Trump and ICE to stop this madness!" Trump's border and tariff policies had by then cost Maine nearly 750,000 Canadian land crossings, with taxable retail sales in border communities down 3.3% and restaurant and lodging sales down nearly 5%.
Charles also wants to repeal Maine's new law barring state law enforcement from cooperating with federal immigration investigations and operations, saying "a sanctuary state is a sanctuary for criminal aliens."

Bobby Charles embraced extreme immigration policies that hurt Maine. We deserve better.

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Maine

...it's time to vote MAGA out!

Violent Crime: #1
Murder: #12/49
Firearm Death: #13
Incarceration: #5
Overall Health: #13
Life Expectancy: #23
Food Insecurity: #22
Obesity: #18/48
Women's Health: #6
Child Well-being: #21
Teen Birth Rate: #5
Infant Mortality: #26
Household Income: #30
Poverty Rate: #20
Public Education: #13
Voter Turnout: #4

Overall Rank: #11

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