By Mario Moretto
In an interview with NBC’s chief White House correspondent, Chuck Todd, independent gubernatorial candidate Eliot Cutler answered, once again, the ‘spoiler’ question.
Democrats have attempted to paint a vote for Cutler as a vote for incumbent Republican Gov. Paul LePage. Some Republican pundits have even gone so far as to tell party activists to drum up support for Cutler, as an effort to divide the race and ensure a LePage victory.
As usual, Cutler wasn’t having it.
“I’m not a spoiler, I’m a choice,” he said.
Cutler went on to describe independents’ relatively strong showing in Maine gubernatorial elections. In the past 40 years, he said, Maine has held 10 elections for governor. In three of those elections, the independent candidate won: Jim Longley in 1974 and Angus King in 1994 and 1998.
Read the full article here.
I remember stumbling across a “Liberal” blog last time that savagely attacked Cutler, calling him “The Ralph Nader of Maine” and asserting that he was a spoiler who would take just enough support away from the Democrat to elect LePage. How I wish I had remembered to check back the day after the election.
The way the last election played out Cutler could just as easily claim that the Democratic candidate was a “spoiler”.
Just another case for Instant Runoff Voting.