On July 31, CBS13 reported that the Maine secretary of state's office would not make a determination in response to a July 24 letter from state Rep. James White (R) questioning whether Troy Jackson, the Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate, was eligible to run under the state’s sore loser law. Deputy Secretary of State Kate O'Brien said that it was not an issue for the secretary of state's office to resolve.
Jackson, a former state senator, won the Democratic nominating convention on July 25 to replace Graham Platner (D) as the party's nominee to face U.S. Sen. Susan Collins (R) in the U.S. Senate general election. This is the first time since 1918 that a U.S. Senate nominee has been replaced in Maine.
White argued that Jackson should be disqualified as the nominee because he ran in the Democratic primary for governor earlier this year. State statute says a candidate may not file "whether by primary election or nomination petition, as a candidate for more than one federal, state or county office at any election."
"Courts have likewise recognized that so-called 'sore loser' laws exist to preserve the integrity of the electoral process by preventing candidates who lose one race from obtaining access to the general-election ballot through another path," White said in his letter to Secretary of State Shenna Bellows (D). "Allowing a candidate to seek one statewide office, lose before the voters, and then become the nominee for a different statewide office through a party committee appears inconsistent with both text and purpose of Maine's election laws."
Jackson campaign adviser BJ McCollister said in a statement, "Republicans are so worried that Susan Collins is about to lose, they’re resorting to cheap tricks."
On July 29, University of Maine School of Law professor Dmitry Bam told News Center Maine, "The statute here is not really a sore loser statute. It's kind of a dual filer hedger statute. ... I think somebody could bring the challenge in court and say this person is not eligible. ... I think it's unlikely that [the Secretary of State] would change her mind, and I think it's highly unlikely that the court would reverse the decision anyway."
Maine has separate statutes that effectively prohibit candidates from running in the general election for an office after losing the primary for the same office.
The state is one of 48 with either effective or explicit laws prohibiting candidates who sought and failed to secure a political party's nomination from running as independents or as nominees of another party in the general election for that office. These statutes are commonly called sore loser laws.
As of July 2026, 18 states have laws that explicitly prohibit a candidate who appeared on the primary ballot and was defeated from being placed on the general election ballot.
Other states have laws that effectively ban defeated candidates from running in the general election.
Twenty-three states have laws that effectively ban such candidacies by prohibiting a candidate from running as a member of one party in the primary election and as a member of a different party or as an independent candidate in the general election. These laws are types of cross-filing bans.
Five states have deadlines that preclude a defeated primary candidate from appearing on the general election ballot.
Maine has both a cross-filing ban and deadlines that preclude a defeated primary candidate from appearing on the general election ballot, while Vermont has both explicit and effective sore loser laws. New York and Connecticut do not have sore loser laws.
Whether these laws apply to presidential elections varies by state and has, in some cases, been the subject of litigation. Click here for more information about sore loser laws in presidential elections.
