Daily Mail's take:
Opinion: Graham Platner scandal just got so much worse
Scummy Graham Platner's campaign over but the sleazy story of how he came so close to a
seat has just begun.
In early June, on the eve of
's 2026 Democratic primary, two female reporters at the Gray Lady dropped what, at first, read like a bombshell on Fat Graham.
Over two months and through dozens of interviews, the Times had found three women who dated the combat vet-turned-socialist crusader and described their, 'volatile and "toxic" relationships that were unsettling and at times emotionally wrenching.'
Initially, it seemed like bad news for wiry-haired socialist
and mom-bobbed
, who had endorsed Platner early and often, even as evidence of Nazi sympathies, vicious drunkenness, racist and misogynist remarks and demeaning posts about fellow vets, started to surface.
Would they stick with their comrade now?
Well, do New England commies wear plaid?
The New York Times report turned out to be, in my opinion, one of the dirtiest deceits to run in the paper of record since…
.
Curiously, the only woman who alleged detailed, on-the-record abuse in the article was Lyndsey Fifield, 'a Virginia conservative who has worked for right-leaning groups and Republican campaigns.'
The implication of that description was, to many, as subtle as the SS tat on Platner's flabby teat. The only
serious accuser was coded as a politically motivated ax-grinder, seeking revenge on an ex who was running to unseat a Republican and tip the balance of power in Washington.
But Fifield claimed that Platner hurt her; allegedly shaking her by the shoulders leaving marks, one time twisting her arm and another shoving her in a bedroom and refusing to let her out. Didn't that count for anything?
Apparently, not much.
Her story was presented alongside anonymous women who claimed Platner was 'a fun and caring partner' and 'they felt safe with him.'
Then came the real trick.
'The Times… reviewed some of Ms Fifield's diary entries from after the relationship had ended,' the reporters wrote, 'and spoke with two of her friends who confirmed that the pair had an emotionally volatile relationship but could not corroborate the physical altercations or the most controversial comments she described.'
'Not corroborate'
Presto chango.
The allegations were transformed into unverified rumor from a Republican shill. 'Seems like a lot of nothing,' Democratic Senator Sheldon Whitehouse said about the Times report. 'I mean, the only one who had anything to say that seemed unsettling was a woman who works for right-wing political operations.'
As for Platner, he was on his way to a primary victory. He denied the allegations, said sorry for being a nasty drunk and amassed a new wheelbarrow load of endorsements.
But here's the catch: Fifield wasn't the 'only one.'
On Monday, Jenny Racicot, a 41-year-old Maine Democrat, who had also dated Platner, told Politico that Platner walked into her home uninvited in 2021 and sexually assaulted her.
Racicot reportedly showed Politico emails with her therapist discussing the attack and a boyfriend said she confided in him about it in 2023.
Again, Platner denies the claim, though her story set off a cascade of retracted endorsements and calls for Platner to shut his clam and leave the race and, suddenly, many of those who were so quick to dismiss Fifield's claims were forced to take a second look.
'I actually understand why Democrat leaders didn't take our stories seriously when the Times reported them in June but are taking them seriously now,' Fifield posted Monday on X. 'It was by design. The line most shared from the piece was the claim that the Times 'could not corroborate' my story despite talking to two of my friends.
'I gave them the contact information for five friends. They called the two who I clarified would not know about the abuse but would be able to affirm our relationship timeline, events, etc. They simply did not call the other three.'
If true, the New York Times needs to answer for that, but in the meantime, I'll do their job for them.
I spoke to Emily Zanotti, a longtime pal and confidant of Fifield, who says she could have backed up her friend's story, if only someone had called her.
'Lyndsey and I spoke at length after she broke up with Graham and she described in vivid details things that happened to her,' Zanotti said. 'She told me in confidence and contemporaneously and she told that to the Times, but they never reached out.'
Zanotti wouldn't reveal what Fifield had initially held back but said she knew of 'incidents that happened during intimacy.'
'He would pull condoms off,' Fifield told the Washington Post on Tuesday. 'He would do it in a sneaky way. He wouldn't tell me.' Fifield claimed she told the Times the same in an off-the-record conversation.
Platner's campaign called that allegation 'categorically false and politically motivated.'
One of the sickest ironies of this nauseating saga is that Racicot was also in the New York Times story, but she only said that Platner' behavior was 'reckless' and 'unsettling.' She wasn't ready to go public at the time, torn between 'supporting [Platner's] politics, but not supporting him as a person' she later said.
Only after she saw how Fifield was being dismissed did Racicot decide to come forward, again. 'I just want the truth out there,' she said. 'I just want people to have a whole scope of who he is as a person.'
Indeed, Zanotti told me, Fifield didn't really want to talk either.
She was a reluctant whistle-blower, but the Times reporters, Zanotti said, convinced her friend to participate, allegedly saying that hers was going to be one among many.
'Lyndsey and I talked consistently for weeks before the New York Times published,' said Zanotti. 'They started talking to her two months before it all started and told her that there were five other women who were willing to speak about their sexual encounters with Platner. 'According to Lyndsey, the Times told her that her encounter was tame compared to the others. It was one of the big reasons that she agreed to talk.'
'Even the before night she spoke to them, she believed that multiple people would be talking to the Times on background. And then the story drops and she's the main character and everyone else is a footnote.'
This all leads to one big question, if the Times reporters only referenced 'three women' in their reporting, where are the other two?
'They just disappeared,' said Zanotti. 'Do they even exist? I don't think the Times would have made women up. My guess is they exist.'
Indeed. The New York Times needs to tell us everything.
In response to Zanotti's claims, the Times told The Daily Mail, 'The story carefully reported what we could confirm at the time, was factually accurate and fair, and it alerted the public to important new information about a candidate for the Senate.'
Handwringing and apologies from the likes of Times opinion columnist Michelle Goldberg ring as hollow as the retracted endorsements.
'While I'm assigning blame, I shouldn't leave myself out,' Goldberg wrote in a limp mea culpa on Tuesday. 'Impressed by Platner's political charisma, I wrote that he was "nothing like the edgelord caricature I encountered online." If anything, he seems to be significantly worse.'
Guess what Michelle, you can absolutely leave yourself out… out of political reporting!
You were so smitten with this flannel-clad fraud that you ceased to be a journalist. Shuck you!
Platner went splat. This story is just getting started.
