Bruce Poliquin, the
incumbent representative for the second district, defeated Democrat
Emily Cain in the
2016 election in a rematch of the
2014 election where Poliquin was first elected. Poliquin ran for the Republican nomination unopposed. Cain did not challenge Poliquin again, instead taking a job with the progressive group
Emily's List. Initially, six candidates filed for the Democratic nomination —
United States Postal Service employee and activist Phil Cleaves, carpenter and former Maine State Senate candidate Jonathan Fulford, Assistant Majority Leader of the State House of Representatives
Jared Golden, shopkeeper and former chair of the
Isleboro Board of Selectmen Craig Olson, businessman and former State Senate candidate Tim Rich, and conservationist Lucas St. Clair. Cleaves, Rich and Fulford dropped out at various points in the campaign, though Fulford's withdrawal happened too late for his name to be removed from the primary ballot. Several candidates received prominent endorsements; St. Clair was endorsed by the
League of Conservation Voters and California Congressman
Jared Huffman, Fulford by the left-wing group
Our Revolution prior to his withdrawal from the race, and Golden by
VoteVets, Massachusetts Congressman
Seth Moulton and over two dozen members of the Maine Legislature. Golden defeated St. Clair and Olson in the second round of the ranked-choice vote tabulation. In addition, two third-party candidates announced their candidacies for the seat:
Houlton Band of Maliseets State Representative
Henry John Bear of the
Maine Green Independent Party and Brian Kresge of the
Libertarian Party. Bear, a former Democrat, left the party due to its stance on water rights for Maine's native people. He failed to qualify for the ballot. Kresge, a veteran and writer, withdrew from the race to run for a seat in the State House of Representatives. Neither the Libertarians nor Green Independents had a candidate on the ballot. Two independent candidates qualified for the ballot: Tiffany Bond, an attorney from
Portland (a city outside of the second district), and Will Hoar, a schoolteacher.
Republican primary Declared •
Bruce Poliquin, incumbent U.S. representative
Results Democratic primary Candidates Declared •
Jared Golden, Assistant Majority Leader of the
Maine House of Representatives • Craig Olson, former chair of the
Islesboro Board of Selectmen • Lucas St. Clair, conservationist, restaurateur, and son of
Roxanne Quimby Withdrawn • Phil Cleaves,
United States Postal Service employee • Jonathan Fulford, farmer, carpenter, and two-time
Maine Senate candidate • Tim Rich, businessman
Declined •
Troy Jackson, Minority Leader of the
Maine Senate and candidate for this seat in
2014 • Ben Sprague,
Bangor City Councilor •
Jared Golden: $618,380.33 • Lucas St. Clair: $424,958.42 • Jonathan Fulford (withdrawn): $166,989.79 • Craig Olson: $100,299.00 • Tim Rich (withdrawn): $72,197.20 •
Emily Cain (not running): $24,692.88
Debates Results % (gross) = percent of all valid votes cast (without eliminating the exhausted votes) % (net) = percent of votes cast after eliminating the exhausted votes
Green primary Failed to make the ballot •
Henry John Bear, state representative for
Houlton Band of Maliseet Indians Libertarian primary Withdrawn • Brian Kresge, writer (running for
State House)
Independent candidates • Tiffany Bond, attorney • Will Hoar, schoolteacher Though Poliquin led in the first round of vote tabulation by 2,171 votes, he did not have a majority of the votes, initiating the ranked-choice tabulation process. Poliquin filed a lawsuit in
federal court on November 13, seeking an order to halt the second-round tabulation of ballots and declare ranked-choice voting unconstitutional. Poliquin's request for an
injunction to halt the ranked-choice voting process was rejected, shortly before
Matthew Dunlap, the
Maine Secretary of State, announced Golden as the winner by 3,509 votes after votes for
independent candidates Tiffany Bond and Will Hoar were eliminated and ballots with these votes had their second- or third-choice votes counted. Poliquin requested a recount of the ballots just before the deadline of November 26. After several days of counting with the result not being significantly changed, Poliquin ended the recount after incurring $15,000 in fees. and asked Judge
Lance Walker, the
federal judge hearing his lawsuit, to order a new election be held should he decline to hold ranked-choice voting unconstitutional. Judge Walker ruled against Poliquin on the merits on December 13, rejecting all of his arguments. Poliquin appealed to the
Court of Appeals in
Boston and requested an order to prevent Golden from being certified as the winner, but that request was rejected. On December 24, Poliquin dropped his lawsuit, allowing Golden to take the seat. As a result, Poliquin became the first incumbent to lose the 2nd Congressional District since 1916, whereas Golden became the first member of Congress to be elected via ranked-choice voting. This also made New England's delegation to the House entirely Democratic for the first time since 2012. Gov.
Paul LePage, as one of his last acts in office, reluctantly initialed the certificate of election for Golden, adding the words "stolen election" to it to express his personal dislike of ranked-choice voting. Golden was re-elected to a third term in 2022 in a rematch with Poliquin.
Endorsements Polling Predictions Debate Results % (gross) = percent of all valid votes cast (without eliminating the exhausted votes) % (net) = percent of votes cast after eliminating the exhausted votes Poliquin led on first preferences with 46.4% to Golden's 45.6% and 8.1% for the two independents. However, as no candidate had a majority of the votes, the votes cast for the two independents were redistributed between Poliquin and Golden (those that didn't give a preference for either of the candidates were exhausted) and Golden won the election. The reason both independents were eliminated in a single round, as opposed to only the 4th place candidate, was because of the mathematical impossibility of the 3rd place candidate moving into 2nd place even if they had received all of the 4th place candidate's redistributed votes. Of the votes left in the count, Golden won with 50.62% of the vote to Poliquin's 49.38%. Including exhausted votes, the final count was Golden 49.2%, Poliquin 48.0%, and 2.8% exhausted. The votes for the two independents were redistributed as follows: 44.5% went to Golden, 20.3% went to Poliquin, and 35.2% were exhausted votes (i.e., they didn't give a preference to either of the remaining candidates). ==See also==