Westbrook, MAINE – Auto-body repair chain shop owner and Republican gubernatorial candidate Shawn Moody is doubling-down on his effort to be just like Governor Paul LePage as he runs to the extreme right to try to win the Republican primary. Asked during an interview on WVOM radio last Friday whether or not tying himself so closely to LePage and his policies was a political risk, Moody didn’t hesitate in responding “absolutely not”.
Moody has been working overtime to reshape his political persona in the image of Paul LePage. Moody hired the governor’s daughter to run his campaign and is shelling out the big bucks to have LePage’s D.C. political consultant tell him what to say and what to think in the race for the Republican nomination. Moody’s listened closely, too, adopting much of Governor LePage’s divisive rhetoric and backward policy ideas, but Moody has never missed an opportunity to praise the governor and avoided every chance to criticize him.
“Embracing Paul LePage may help Moody win the Republican primary, but it’s only going to hurt Maine in the long run,” said Phil Bartlett, Chairman of the Maine Democratic Party. “Under LePage, Maine’s economy has grown more slowly than the rest of New England and the nation, the opioid crisis has grown worse and taken more lives than years past, and rural Maine continues to struggle with no help in sight. So, while Moody works hard to mimic the governor and pledges to be another four years of ignoring these serious problems, Maine Democrats will work hard to solve them so we can build a brighter, more prosperous future for all Maine people.”
To make it worse, for running so far and so fast to the right, Moody can’t even seem to settle on a clear answer for why he signed up to become a Republican in the first place. Asked on WVOM, Moody said that it’s the party that most closely aligns with his values – but in interviews past, Moody has also thrown out a whole host of different reasons, including: 1) he needed the support of a political party after his last failed bid for governor; 2) he was only previously an independent because he didn’t want to drive away customers from his business (despite eschewing the party in the past); and 3) he didn’t want to be a spoiler candidate(which seems to imply that he thought he was in 2010, which saw LePage’s election, and that he doesn’t want to replicate that mistake again).
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