New York: The former director of Maine’s Center for Disease Control and Prevention has pulled out of the race for U.S. Senate.
His decision came after Troy Jackson locked up a majority of the delegates in advance of this Saturday’s Democratic nominating convention.
“A few weeks ago, I entered this race because I could not accept the idea of Susan Collins gliding to a sixth term at the very moment Maine’s families are being forced to pay for the price of her votes. Today I am stepping aside, and I am doing it exactly for the same reason that led me to get in: we must defeat Susan Collins, and the Democratic Party must be unified to do it,” Shah posted on X.
He went on to endorse Jackson, saying Collins is not a moderate while pointing out “she voted for the Iraq War, gave ICE billions with no meaningful guardrails and helped put Brett Kavanaugh on the U.S. Supreme Court before Roe was overturned.”
If elected, Shah would have become the only Indian American in the U.S. Senate and just the second one following Kamala Harris.
As CNN reports, Jackson won 460 of the 500 delegate slots at caucuses held in 16 counties across Maine on Sunday. That’s out of a total of 601 delegates who will cast their votes at the nominating convention scheduled for Bangor this coming Saturday.
According to Politico, some Democrats are expressing concerns that Jackson lacks the charisma of Graham Platner who overwhelmingly won the primary but dropped out after sexual assault allegations that he continues to deny.
“Whether you supported me from the beginning, or are still deciding, or support another candidate, there is a place for you in this movement,” Jackson said over the weekend. “Because we’re not going to defeat Susan Collins by making this movement smaller. There’s no way that that’s ever going to work.
