As of this writing, Graham Platner has still not officially dropped out of the Maine Senate race. That may have changed by the time you read this, however, because he is reportedly going to make some sort of announcement tonight. Everyone knows what he's going to do already, though. So the two big questions before Maine Democrats now are: who is going to replace him, and how will the replacement candidate be selected?

Election law is mum on the subject of the process to be used. If Platner withdraws before the deadline (next Monday), then it is completely up to the Maine Democratic Party to decide how to replace him -- which they will have two weeks to accomplish (the second deadline is July 27th). They can use any method they wish to name a replacement -- including just selecting someone themselves and presenting their choice to the voters.

This would be a very bad idea. When Joe Biden dropped out of his re-election campaign, some in the party pushed hard for some sort of way to get the voters involved with the process. However, this did not happen. Biden's withdrawal was so late in the campaign cycle that most state primaries had already happened and the only deciding factor was how many convention delegates would back which candidate (since the official nomination would happen during the convention). Kamala Harris did an impressive job of rounding up and locking down a majority of the delegates' votes within the first day or so after Biden's announcement. At the time, I personally thought this was a good thing, because it avoided a big intraparty squabble over the nomination.

I was wrong about that, I will freely admit. Harris didn't live up to expectations and the great unanswered question of the 2024 presidential election was whether or not a different Democratic candidate would have had a better chance against Donald Trump.

This is why Maine's Democratic Party should definitely not choose a candidate in some back room with only a few top party leaders making the decision. Whether the replacement candidate wins or loses against Senator Susan Collins, the choice of candidate should be made (in some fashion) by the Democratic voters and not the party establishment.

Platner is reportedly trying to influence the choice of replacement behind the scenes as well, which has already led to some intraparty squabbling. It's understandable why he would do so -- he's gone from being the Democratic nominee for the Senate race to an absolute pariah within his own party in just the last two days. That's a long way to fall, and it must be very hard for him to face this reversal of fortunes (it would hit anyone hard is all I am saying here, to be clear). Platner doesn't want to see a candidate replace him who doesn't agree with his priorities and issues, which is an important thing in this race because he was such an outsider insurgent, running on a very progressive platform. Replacing him with a traditional middle-of-the-road establishment Democrat would be a slap in the face to all of the Maine voters who supported Platner. But this is beyond his control at this point, and the sooner he realizes it the better. Platner's endorsement (whether stated or implied) is political poison right now, so he should not be involved in the replacement's choice at all.

As stated, Maine election law is mum on the process. The Party leaders can do anything they want as long as they file paperwork with someone's name on it by the 27th. That obviously isn't a lot of time, so holding another primary election with printed ballots is probably not feasible. Some sort of caucus system will likely be used instead.

There are a number of candidates who could be viable and acceptable choices for Maine Democrats. There should be a lighting-fast mini-campaign held between them all, complete with debates, townhalls, and other ways to meet voters and build support. Many of the people that have been mentioned as possible replacements have actually run political campaigns this year, for various different offices. Some of them have also held political offices in the past in the state. This means they won't have to completely introduce themselves to the voters and they already have a certain degree of name recognition.

It's going to be a very compressed timeline -- that cannot be avoided. But in the end, the voters of Maine deserve to make this choice. Not the party bigwigs or Graham Platner. That way, win or lose, there won't be fingers pointed and blame assessed about how the choice was made, after the fact.

Besides, it's the (small-"D") democratic thing to do. Let Maine's voters decide.

-- Chris Weigant

Follow Chris on Twitter: @ChrisWeigant