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Mark W. Lawrence is a Democratic member of the Maine House of Representatives, representing District 2. He was first elected to the chamber in 2016.
Former Chair, Insurance and Financial Services Committee, Maine State House of Representatives
Chair, Energy, Utilities and Technology
Member, Labor and Housing
Member, Senate Rules
— Father's Name:
— Mother's Name:
1. Abortions should always be illegal.
- No Answer
2. Abortions should be illegal when the fetus is viable, with or without life support.
- No Answer
3. Abortions should always be legally available.
- X
4. Abortions should be legal only within the first trimester of pregnancy.
- No Answer
5. Abortions should be legal when the pregnancy resulted from incest or rape.
- No Answer
6. Abortions should be legal when the life of the woman is endangered.
- No Answer
7. Abortions should be limited by waiting periods and notification requirements as decided by each state government.
- No Answer
8. Prohibit the dilation and extraction procedure, also known as "partial birth" abortion.
- No Answer
9. Prohibit public funding of abortions and public funding of organizations that advocate or perform abortions.
- No Answer
10. Support "buffer-zones" by requiring demonstrators to stay at least five feet from abortion clinic doorways and driveways.
- X
11. Provide funding for family planning programs as a means to decrease the number of abortions.
- X
12. Other
- No Answer
1. Agricultural
- Slightly Increase Funding
2. Arts
- Maintain Funding Status
3. Defense
- Maintain Funding Status
4. Education
- Greatly Increase Funding
5. Environmental
- Slightly Increase Funding
6. International aid
- Maintain Funding Status
7. Law enforcement
- Maintain Funding Status
8. Medical Research
- Greatly Increase Funding
9. National Aeronautical Space Administration (NASA)
- Maintain Funding Status
10. National Parks
- Maintain Funding Status
11. Scientific Research
- Slightly Increase Funding
12. Transportation and Highway Infrastructure
- Slightly Increase Funding
13. Welfare
- Maintain Funding Status
14. Other
- Greatly Increase Funding
15. Would you support enforcing the spending limits agreed to in 1997 by the President and Congress to balance the budget?
- Undecided
1. Armed Forces personnel training
- Slightly Increase Funding
2. Covert intelligence operations
- Slightly Decrease Funding
3. Defense plant conversion
- Slightly Increase Funding
4. Military hardware
- Slightly Decrease Funding
5. Military space shuttle missions
- Maintain Funding Status
6. Pay for active duty personnel
- Slightly Increase Funding
7. National Missile Defense Program
- Greatly Decrease Funding
8. Modernization of weaponry and equipment
- Slightly Decrease Funding
9. Programs to improve military retention rates
- Slightly Increase Funding
10. Research and development of new weapons
- Slightly Decrease Funding
11. Troop and equipment readiness
- Maintain Funding Status
12. Other
- No Answer
1. Defense
- Low Priority
2. Education
- High Priority
3. Federal debt reduction
- High Priority
4. Medicare
- High Priority
5. Social Security
- Highest Priority
6. Tax cuts
- Low Priority
7. Other
- No Answer
1. Less than $25,000
- Slightly Decrease
2. $25,000 - $75,000
- Slightly Decrease
3. $75,000 - $150,000
- Maintain Status
4. Over $150,000
- Maintain Status
5. Other
- No Answer
1. Over $40, 000
- Maintain Status
2. Other
- No Answer
1. Alcohol taxes
- Maintain Status
2. Capital gains taxes
- Maintain Status
3. Cigarette taxes
- Slightly Increase
4. Corporate taxes
- Maintain Status
5. Gasoline taxes
- Slightly Decrease
6. Inheritance taxes
- Slightly Decrease
7. Other
- No Answer
1. Charitable deductions
- Maintain Status
2. Medical expense deductions
- Slightly Increase
3. Mortgage deductions
- Maintain Status
4. Child tax credit
- Greatly Increase
5. Earned income tax credit
- Greatly Increase
6. Student loan tax credit
- Greatly Increase
7. Other
- No Answer
1. Do you support replacing the current U.S. income tax structure with a flat income tax?
- No
2. Should a married couple filing jointly pay the same taxes as if they were an unmarried couple filing separately?
- Yes
3. Would you cut taxes if there were an operating surplus?
- Yes
4. Would you cut taxes and use Social Security surpluses to supplement the difference?
- No
5. Other
- No Answer
1. Support public taxpayer funding for congressional candidates who comply with campaign spending limits.
- X
2. Increase the amount individuals are permitted to contribute to federal campaigns.
- No Answer
3. Prohibit Political Action Committee (PAC) contributions to candidates for federal office.
- No Answer
4. Provide free or low-cost television advertising to candidates who agree to voluntary campaign spending limits.
- X
5. Ban unregulated soft money campaign contributions to political parties or committees.
- X
6. Prohibit non-U.S. citizens from making soft money contributions to national parties or party committees.
- X
7. Require full disclosure of funding sources of issue advocacy commercials which appear within 60 days of an election.
- X
8. Make campaign spending limits mandatory for all federal candidates.
- No Answer
9. Remove all contribution limits on federal candidates and parties, but require complete and immediate disclosure via the Internet.
- No Answer
10. Require congressional candidates to raise over half of their campaign money from their home state.
- No Answer
11. Other
- No Answer
1. Broaden the use of the death penalty for federal crimes.
- No Answer
2. Increase spending to build more federal prisons.
- No Answer
3. Impose "truth in sentencing" for violent criminals so they serve full sentences with no chance of parole.
- No Answer
4. Support programs to provide prison inmates with vocational and job-related skills and job-placement assistance when released.
- No Answer
5. Support programs to provide prison inmates with drug and alcohol addiction treatment.
- X
6. Increase penalties for crimes committed on school grounds.
- X
7. Increase funding for community policing programs.
- X
8. Implement penalties other than incarceration for certain non-violent offenders.
- No Answer
9. Require that crimes based on gender, sexual orientation, and disability be prosecuted as federal hate crimes.
- X
10. Enforcement of civil rights should primarily be the responsibility of the federal government.
- No Answer
11. Prosecute as adults, youths accused of a felony.
- No Answer
12. Provide block grants to states for implementation of programs to combat juvenile crime.
- No Answer
13. Impose harsher penalties for youths convicted of violent offenses.
- No Answer
14. Support the use of "boot camps" as alternative sentencing for juvenile offenders.
- No Answer
15. Support programs that provide job training and placement services for at-risk youth.
- No Answer
16. Other
- No Answer
1. Increase penalties for selling illegal drugs.
- X
2. Support mandatory jail sentences for selling illegal drugs.
- No Answer
3. Support capital punishment for convicted international drug traffickers.
- No Answer
4. Expand federally sponsored drug education and drug treatment programs.
- X
5. Decriminalize the use of marijuana for medicinal purposes.
- No Answer
6. Increase border security to stop the flow of illegal drugs into the U.S.
- No Answer
7. Eliminate federal funding for programs associated with the "war on drugs."
- No Answer
8. Other
- No Answer
1. Support national standards and testing of public school students.
- No Answer
2. Allow parents to use vouchers (equal opportunity scholarships) to send their children to any publicly-funded school.
- No Answer
3. Allow parents to use vouchers (equal opportunity scholarships) to send their children to any participating school: public, private or religious.
- No Answer
4. Allow parents to use tax-free savings accounts to send their children to any publicly-funded school.
- No Answer
5. Allow parents to use tax-free savings accounts to send their children to any participating school: public, private or religious.
- No Answer
6. Support charter schools where teachers and professionals receive authorization and funding to establish new schools.
- No Answer
7. Promote education flexibility by giving federal funds, in the form of block grants, to the states to spend it as they see fit.
- No Answer
8. Increase funding for block grants to states to help them hire additional teachers.
- X
9. Support teacher testing and reward teachers with merit pay.
- No Answer
10. Increase funding for computers and computer training in public schools.
- X
11. Increase funding for school capital improvements (e.g. buildings and infrastructure).
- X
12. Eliminate restrictions on federal education funding, giving educators or local school districts more flexibility to design and implement their programs.
- No Answer
13. Support affirmative action in public college admissions.
- X
14. Eliminate federal financial aid for individuals convicted of drug offenses.
- No Answer
15. Increase funding of programs such as Pell grants and Stafford loans to help students pay for college.
- X
16. Support federal tax incentives to help families save for college.
- X
17. Other
- X
1. Provide tax credits for companies that move job-creating industries into areas with high unemployment.
- X
2. Increase funding for national job-training programs that re-train displaced workers or teach skills needed in today's job market.
- X
3. Reduce government regulation of the private sector in order to encourage investment and economic expansion.
- X
4. Establish empowerment zones in areas with large numbers of unemployed people.
- X
5. Eliminate any federal programs designed to reduce unemployment.
- No Answer
6. Increase the federal minimum wage.
- X
7. Encourage employers to offer flex-time scheduling, comp-time, and unpaid leave for family emergencies.
- X
8. Provide tax credits for businesses that offer on-site child care.
- X
9. The federal government should consider race and sex in making government contracting decisions.
- X
10. The federal government should continue affirmative action programs.
- X
11. The federal government should discontinue affirmative action programs.
- No Answer
12. The federal government should utilize merit and qualifications in making government contracting decisions.
- No Answer
13. Other
- No Answer
1. Strengthen the regulation and enforcement of the Clean Water Act.
- X
2. Strengthen the regulation and enforcement of the Clean Air Act.
- X
3. Waive environmental review requirements for grazing permits.
- No Answer
4. Revise the 1872 mining law to increase the fees charged to mining companies using federal lands.
- No Answer
5. Require states to fully compensate citizens when environmental regulations limit uses of privately owned land.
- No Answer
6. Encourage further development and use of alternative fuels to reduce pollution.
- X
7. Strengthen emission controls on all gasoline or diesel-powered engines, including cars, trucks, and sport utility vehicles.
- X
8. Promote the selling of pollution credits between nations to encourage industries to decrease pollution levels.
- No Answer
9. Strengthen logging restrictions on federal lands.
- X
10. Reduce current federal regulations on the environment.
- No Answer
11. Give states added flexibility from the federal government in enforcing and funding federal environment regulations.
- No Answer
12. Other
- No Answer
1. Ban the sale or transfer of semi-automatic guns, except those used for hunting.
- No Answer
2. Maintain and strengthen the enforcement of existing federal restrictions on the purchase and possession of guns.
- X
3. Ease federal restrictions on the purchase and possession of guns.
- No Answer
4. Repeal federal restrictions on the purchase and possession of guns.
- No Answer
5. Allow citizens to carry concealed guns.
- X
6. Require manufacturers to provide child-safety locks on guns.
- No Answer
7. Increase penalties for the possession of any illegal guns.
- No Answer
8. Hold gun owners responsible for crimes committed with their guns by children age 16 and under.
- No Answer
9. Raise the minimum age for ownership of handguns from 18 to 21.
- No Answer
10. Require background checks of gun buyers at gun shows.
- X
11. Require a license for gun possession.
- No Answer
12. Other
- No Answer
1. Providing health care is not a responsibility of the federal government.
- No Answer
2. Implement a universal health care program to guarantee coverage to all Americans regardless of income.
- X
3. Support health care strategies focused on prevention, including health education, and natural medicines and remedies.
- X
4. Support a Patient's Bill of Rights to define and enforce the rights of insured patients, including greater access to specialists and emergency rooms, wider choice of health care providers, and appeal mechanisms when claims are denied.
- X
5. Support a Patient's Bill of Rights which includes the right to sue when claims are denied.
- X
6. Support a Patient's Bill of Rights which includes the right to appeal to an administrative board of specialists when services are denied.
- X
7. Provide tax incentives to small businesses that provide health care to their employees.
- X
8. Expand eligibility for tax-free medical savings accounts, which would be taxed if used for purposes other than medical costs.
- No Answer
9. Limit the amount of damages that can be awarded in medical malpractice lawsuits.
- No Answer
10. Allow states and local communities to use federal funds for needle-exchange programs to combat the spread of HIV.
- X
11. Provide citizens age 55-65 the option of purchasing Medicare health coverage.
- X
12. Support legislation to provide prescription drug coverage under Medicare.
- X
13. Increase funding for AIDS programs.
- X
14. Other
- X
1. Decrease the number of immigrants allowed into the country.
- No Answer
2. Increase the eligibility of legal immigrants for certain social programs (e.g. public housing, food stamps).
- X
3. Require the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) to reduce the time between applying for citizenship and taking the oath of allegiance to six months.
- X
4. Provide extra federal aid to states with higher numbers of immigrants for necessary medical and social services.
- No Answer
5. Prohibit states from passing laws that deny human services (medical care, education) to illegal immigrants or their children.
- No Answer
6. Grant U.S. citizenship to children born in the US only if their parents immigrated legally.
- No Answer
7. Increase the immigration quota for computer scientists and other information technology workers.
- No Answer
8. Establish English as the official national language.
- No Answer
9. Support the separation of the INS into two bureaus: one administering naturalization and one administering border patrol.
- X
10. Increase state autonomy in handling immigration issues.
- No Answer
11. Reimburse states for providing services to illegal aliens.
- No Answer
12. Other
- No Answer
1. Aid should be granted to countries when extraordinary circumstances cause disaster and threaten civilian lives.
- X
2. Aid should be granted to countries when it is in the security interests of the U. S.
- X
3. Aid should be granted to countries that are close allies of the U. S. and in need of financial/military assistance.
- X
4. Aid should be eliminated for any nation with documented human rights abuses.
- No Answer
5. Aid programs should be scaled back and eventually eliminated except for extraordinary circumstances.
- No Answer
6. Other
- No Answer
1. The U.S. should resolve future disputes with Iraq only through diplomatic means.
- No Answer
2. The U.S. should take unilateral military action if Iraq does not comply with all accepted United Nations resolutions.
- No Answer
3. The U.S. should take military action against Iraq only as part of an international effort.
- X
4. The U.S. should end the economic embargo against Iraq.
- No Answer
5. The U.S. should not continue to play a prominent leadership role in the peace process between Israel and the Palestine Authority.
- No Answer
6. The U.S. should continue to play a prominent leadership role in the peace process between Israel and the Palestine Authority.
- X
7. Other
- No Answer
1. The U.S. should participate in United Nations peacekeeping missions only when vital U.S. interests are involved.
- No Answer
2. The U.S. should not commit military troops to United Nations peacekeeping missions.
- No Answer
3. The U.S. should withdraw completely from the United Nations.
- No Answer
4. The U.S. should pay its debt to the United Nations.
- X
5. Other
- No Answer
6. Should the U.S. have full diplomatic relations with Cuba?
- Yes
7. Should the U.S. have full diplomatic relations with China?
- Yes
8. Should the U.S. recognize and extend full diplomatic relations to Taiwan?
- Undecided
9. Should the US maintain ground troops in Kosovo?
- Yes
10. Do you support the cooperative threat reduction programs with Russia to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons to unfriendly nations?
- Yes
11. Do you support modifying the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty in order to deploy the National Missile Defense System?
- No
1. Do you support the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA)?
- Yes
2. Do you support the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT)?
- Yes
3. Do you support continued U.S. membership in the World Trade Organization (WTO)?
- Yes
4. Do you support China becoming a member of the World Trade Organization?
- No
5. Do you support imposing tariffs on products imported from nations that maintain restrictive trade barriers on American products?
- Yes
6. Should a nation's human rights record affect its normal trade relations (most favored nation status) with the United States?
- Yes
7. Do you support normal trade relations (most favored nation status) with Vietnam?
- Yes
8. Do you support granting the President "fast-track" authority in trade negotiations?
- No
9. Do you support the trade embargo against Cuba?
- No
1. Do you believe there has been a decline in moral and ethical standards in America over the last four decades?
- Undecided
2. If Yes, please explain what you would do as a member of Congress to address this concern.
- No Answer
1. Allow workers to invest a portion of their payroll tax in private accounts which they manage themselves.
- No Answer
2. Allow workers to invest a portion of their payroll tax in private accounts managed by private firms contracted by the government.
- No Answer
3. Invest a portion of Social Security's assets collectively in stocks and bonds instead of U.S. Treasury securities.
- No Answer
4. Increase the payroll tax to better finance Social Security in its current form.
- No Answer
5. Lower Social Security's annual cost-of-living increases.
- No Answer
6. Limit Social Security benefits based on recipients' other income and assets.
- No Answer
7. Require individuals to pay the Social Security tax on incomes above $68,400 (which is currently exempt).
- No Answer
8. Support a lock box measure, limiting Congress's ability to spend Social Security and Medicare surpluses on any other federal programs except Social Security and Medicare, until each program's long-term solvency is guaranteed.
- X
9. Other
- No Answer
1. Continuing the moratorium on Internet sales taxes.
- No Answer
2. Implement regulation of Internet content by the federal government.
- No Answer
3. Support on-line voter registration.
- No Answer
4. Support voting on-line.
- No Answer
5. Support government mandates to curtail violent and sexual content on television.
- No Answer
6. Support strict penalties for Internet crimes such as hacking and Internet violence.
- No Answer
7. Support strong Internet privacy laws.
- X
8. Regulating the Internet should not in any way be controlled by the federal government.
- No Answer
9. Other
- No Answer
Do you support amending the Constitution to limit the number of terms which members of Congress can serve?
- No
1. Support housing assistance for welfare recipients.
- No Answer
2. Provide homeless families with apartment vouchers they can use to supplement the cost of an apartment.
- No Answer
3. Continue to give states and local governments responsibility for welfare programs through TANF block grants.
- X
4. Maintain current welfare-to-work requirements in order for states to qualify for block grants.
- No Answer
5. Restore food stamp programs to legal immigrants.
- X
6. Transfer homeless housing programs to states through block grants.
- No Answer
7. Provide continued Medicaid benefits for those welfare recipients who have moved from welfare to work.
- X
8. Require states to return any unused welfare block grant funding to the federal government.
- No Answer
9. Direct federal poverty aid through religious, community-based or other non-profit organizations.
- No Answer
10. Other
- No Answer
Please explain what your top two or three priorities will be if elected. Please explain how you would obtain any additional government funding needed to implement these priorities.
- My first priority will be reducing presciption drugs costs for seniors and working families. I will vote for a Medicare drug benefit and introduce legislation to negotiate directly with the pharmaceutical industry to reduce drugs costs for all Americans. I strongly support enacting a strong Patient's Bill of Rights that covers all Americans. And I support devoting a portion of the budget surplus to dramatically increasing funding for school construction, class-size reduction and teacher training.
SeaCoast Online - "Lawrence: Democrat for Congress" There will be a narrow window of opportunity, said candidate Mark Lawrence, for great measures to be taken in Washington measures that will rival the New Deal and the social advances made by the Kennedy administration, measures that will have implications for the next 40 years. The window opens next January with a new president and a new Congress, he said, but it will only remain open for four years at most. If nothing happens, if more of the same stagnation continues, that opportunity will be lost. Lawrence said Maine and the rest of the country hunger for change, as evidenced by massive voter turnout at polling places and caucuses, and he wants to be in Washington to ensure those voices are heard. "There's a great sense among the public that they have to take control, that Washington is just not delivering," he said. He lays blame for much of this squarely at the feet of his own Democratic Party, which he said "has not done the things we had hoped for them to do." For example, he said, Democrats did not start impeachment proceedings against President George Bush, and they backed off withdrawal from Iraq. Both were mistakes, he said. As the York County district attorney, an elected position he's held since 2003, "I see an erosion of constitutional rights on an everyday basis." Data mining, warrantless wiretaps, suspension of habeas corpus are all erosions of the Constitution and all reasons to have investigated impeachment. As for the war in Iraq, Lawrence is unequivocal. "We have to end it now," he said. "In my opinion, it's done nothing for us as a country. It's damaged our foreign relations, it's detrimentally affected our economy, and I can't see how it's in America's interest to stay longer." He said he believes the Pentagon already has a plan for pullout that is only waiting for a president to give the word. And if the new president decides to stay in Iraq? "We (the Congress) hold the purse strings. We vote to defund it." Ending the war is one of the bold initiatives that needs to be taken immediately next year. Another is health-care legislation. Lawrence said the only solution is a single-payer system, "and I'm not afraid to say it. We spend 16 percent of our gross domestic product on health care, and it's 9 percent in every other industrialized country that has a single-payer system. It's a tremendous drag on our economy." Lawrence is extremely concerned about that economy, a concern that he says stretches back to his childhood growing up in Kittery, the son of a Portsmouth Naval Shipyard worker. He said his mother apportioned every dime of his father's income, including setting aside money for a college fund for Lawrence and his brothers. "When I graduated Bowdoin College in 1980, it cost $7,000 a year. Now, it costs $50,000," he said. "There's been a slow nickel-and-diming of the middle class, with wealth transferring to an elite." That elite is made up in part of oil company magnates who make huge salaries, he said, due to erroneous federal policies. "We're subsidizing oil companies to look for the last drop of oil when we should be subsidizing alternative energy companies." Lawrence faces a challenge from five other contenders for the Democratic nomination in the June 10 primary. As a former state representative and senator from Kittery and now as district attorney, he said he feels he has "a huge advantage in southern York County, because I have a unique understanding of this area. "People know me. They know what I stand for. They know how hard I fought for the shipyard. I've been through two base-closure lists." He said he's making inroads in other parts of the district as people hear his message. "Winning an election isn't the end, it's the beginning," he said. "You have to deliver on your agenda."
Wiscasset Newspaper - "Six Congressional Candidates Meet In Bath for Debate" Six Democrats sat side by side in the Bath Middle School cafeteria Sunday night, talking about why they disagree with Republicans, and why they also disagree with one another on occasion. Three newspaper editors and residents of the midcoast area quizzed the candidates, who are all trying to win their party's nomination next month in Maine's First Congressional District. The seat is now held by U.S. Rep. Tom Allen, who is not seeking re-election to the seat. The debate was sponsored and organized by Coastal Journal editor, Geena Hamilton. Others on the panel were Jim McCarthy, managing editor of the Times Record, and Paula Gibbs, editor of the Wiscasset Newspaper. The candidates are Michael Brennan, Adam Cote, Mark Lawrence, Steve Meister, Chellie Pingree and Ethan Strimling. One of the common views of the candidates was their opposition to the Bush administration's "shredding of the Constitution," especially the passage of the Patriot's Act. Mark Lawrence, who has been a District Attorney in York County, said, "You can be tough on crime without trampling people's Constitutional rights." Another common theme was, in the words of Ethan Strimling, "the Bush tax policy set up to benefit the rich." Predatory lending by some of the banks and mortgage companies came under fire from several of the candidates, including Adam Cote, who said Congress should crack down on the practice and provide incentives to switch over to 30 year fixed mortgages. Lawrence agreed. "The Congress should hold immediate hearings on this. Our banking regulatory system was created in the 1930s - there are lending schemes outside of this. Credit card companies encourage people to go further and further into debt. We used to have usury laws the regulated interest charges. Chellie Pingree agreed. "There has been a lack of oversight on the part of the government. The Democrats are just as much at fault on this as the Republicans are," she said. Pingree said Congress should look into providing "bail outs" for areas of the country where there are entire neighborhoods of abandoned homes. Michael Brennan called for the establishment of a consumer products division, "so that consumers have a better way to evaluate problems." "Congress bailed out Bear Stearns, but they haven't figured out how to bail out homeowners," he added. Jim McCarthy asked the candidates which committee they would like to serve on and why. Brennan said Energy and Commerce or Health Care and Education. Steve Meister, a pediatrician, said he would also like to serve on the Energy and Commerce Committee because of the need to oversee pharmaceutical companies. Strimling said being on the Ways and Means Committee would give him an opportunity to influence how revenue is collected and repeal the Bush tax cuts. Cote said if he served on the Energy and Commerce Committee, he would be in a position to "influence major legislation to bring money to the Brunswick Naval Air Station for re-development - for a green energy park or a research and technology park." "I would choose Armed Services," Lawrence said, in order to protect the shipyards in Kittery and Bath. Admitting the chance of a freshman getting on the Appropriations Committee isn't great, Pingree said this would be her choice. "This is where we spend our money, and where I could do the most for Maine," she said. Asked whether they would vote for more money for the war in Iraq, Pingree, Lawrence, Strimling, and Brennan all said they would not. Pingree noted that she also opposed the war in 2002. Both Cote and Meister said they oppose continuing the war, but agreed there cannot be an immediate pullout. Cote served in Iraq, leading over 100 missions. "The problem is we tried to transplant a society into another culture," Cote said. Meister, who served in the U.S. Navy in the Gulf War, said, "We can't just suddenly leave - there would be a horrible humanitarian disaster."
Waldo County Citizen - "Health care, economy, Iraq top concerns for 1st Congressional Democrats" Six people are vying for the Democratic nomination for the 1st Congressional District. Following are their takes on the issues:Advertisement Michael Brennan Michael Brennan, a licensed clinical social worker who works on child and family issues at the Muskie School of Public Service, served in the Legislature from 1992 to 2006, first as a House member and then in the Senate. He's running for Congress, he said, because what was once taken for granted in this country is no longer available to the working class. "The cost of education and the cost of health care in this country have gotten to the point that working-class and middle-class people can no longer have even the smallest part of the American dream," he said. Brennan supports universal health care and scholarships to public colleges and universities for all those graduating from public high schools. He believes those programs could be paid for, in part, by ending the war in Iraq. "The first thing I want to do is make sure we end the war in Iraq," he said, and take the money being spent there to help pay for health care and college. Democrats and Republicans alike have continued to fund the war, most recently approving an additional $170 billion appropriation, he said. "That $170 billion gets us pretty close to universal health-care coverage or college for free," he said. Brennan, 55, was born in Portland and has lived there for the last 32 years. He earned a bachelor's degree from Florida State University and a master's from the Muskie School, where he now serves as a policy associate. He talks about the race in terms of his two sons. Brennan said when he and his wife went to pay for their children's college tuition, they had to take out another loan on their home, which they had already paid off once. When one of those sons went to work at a job that didn't offer health insurance, he paid $2,400 a year for a plan with a $10,000 deductible. "At the end of the year, he had paid Anthem $2,400 and had not gotten $1 in health-care coverage," Brennan said. "That's why I'm running for Congress." Adam Cote Adam Cote, an attorney with Pierce Atwood in Portland who served tours of duty in Bosnia and Iraq, points to his family's blue-collar roots and his military service when he's on the campaign trail. "Very few people running for office today come from blue-collar families," Cote said, referring to his life as a youth in Sanford, where his dad was a high school teacher and coach. Cote, who refers to himself as an outsider to the political process, talks about a plan for ending the war in Iraq that is more nuanced than the other Democrats in the 1st Congressional District race. "Everybody's trying to figure out how to get out of Iraq without having a major disaster in the process, but there's only one Iraq war veteran in Congress, and I've spent more time there than any member of Congress," he recently told a gathering. "We must be as careful getting out as we were careless getting in. This means finding a way to bring our troops home that prevents them from needing to return in the future to stop genocide, regional civil war or a terrorist stronghold from forming," he said. Cote was in Iraq from 2004 to 2005 with the Maine National Guard. He also served in Bosnia with the military police, having signed up with the Army Reserve after graduating from Colby College in Waterville. He earned his law degree from the University of Maine School of Law and works for Pierce Atwood on real estate and energy issues. Cote and his wife have three young children and live in Portland. "I have a background in energy issues and the military," Cote said, and can address the war in Iraq and skyrocketing energy prices with experience. At 35, Cote is the youngest candidate in the race. "I think we need some fresh blood in Congress," he said. "I think we need a new generation that's going to bring about some change." Mark Lawrence Mark Lawrence is the district attorney in York County and a former Senate president, who points out he is the only person running for Congress with a law enforcement background. He believes it's time to restore the constitutional balance of power in Washington, which he said the Bush administration has eroded. "We need to restore public trust in government, restore belief that no one is above the law," Lawrence said. That includes President George Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney, he said, whose administration has sanctioned the firings of U.S. attorneys and condoned domestic surveillance programs without judicial review. The leading issues in the campaign, said Lawrence, are the cost of health care, education and an economy that does not offer promise to the middle class. "What we have seen is the slow nickel-and-diming of the American middle class, whether it's in education, whether it's in health care, whether it's in these ridiculous tax cuts that have been passed that have shifted wealth in this country to the extreme wealthiest," he said. Lawrence supports a universal health-care system, similar to ones in Europe or Canada. Like the other Democratic candidates in the race, he believes Social Security must be preserved. He believes the war in Iraq must end, starting with a withdrawal of troops. Lawrence, 49, served four years in the Statehouse and eight years in the Senate, the last four as Senate president. He ran for U.S. Senate in 2000 against incumbent Sen. Olympia Snowe, and then went on to be York County district attorney. Lawrence attended Bowdoin College as an undergraduate and the University of Maine School of Law. He talks about the rising cost of tuition as a major drag on the middle class. "The day I graduated, 28 years ago, my college tuition cost one-quarter of my father's salary at the [Kittery] shipyard," he said. "Today, the person who holds his job, his entire salary would go to pay one year of the college I went to." Steve Meister Steve Meister, a physician and Navy veteran who has never before run for political office, said he is motivated by the need to improve the military and health-care systems in this country. A pediatrician in Augusta, Meister said he decided to run when a father, bound for Iraq, brought in his son with symptoms of stress. "I said, The last time this happened you were in Iraq,'" Meister recalled. As it turned out the father was being sent back again. "Fifteen-month deployments are way too long and it harms families and it harms service members and somebody needed to do something about it." Meister, a veteran of the first Gulf War when he ran an emergency room in a field hospital near the Kuwait border, calls the war in Iraq a "tragic mistake" but worries that if funding is cut too quickly or without thought, troops will suffer. "I want our combatants home as soon as possible. But I will never vote to leave our troops with inadequate resources," he said. Meister, 53, whose wife is also a doctor, is the father of two college-age sons. He went to Tufts University Medical School on a Navy scholarship and worked for the Navy in California and Kuwait before moving in 1996 to Maine. He is on staff at Maine General Medical Center and works with the state foster-care program, evaluating children's medical and mental health needs when they enter the system. Meister believes steps have to be taken to reduce health-care costs, including introducing electronic medical records, in order to make care more affordable for everyone. He supports universal health care emphasizing preventive care for all children up to age 18 but not a single-payer system. "I have a problem with single-pay because if you have a problem with that payer, you have a problem with the whole system," Meister said. Meister said he decided to run despite his lack of political experience because, "It takes a citizen to stand up and make a difference." Chellie Pingree Chellie Pingree is a former four-term state senator from Knox County, who for four years headed Common Cause in Washington, D.C., before coming back home to run for Congress. Pingree went to work for the national citizen advocacy group after losing a 2002 bid for the U.S. Senate against incumbent Republican Sen. Susan Collins. "It wasn't an easy time. I was opposed to the war. I wanted universal, single-payer health care," she said. Those stands are now part of the lexicon of many of the Democratic candidates running for Congress. Pingree gets kudos on the campaign trail for sponsoring the first-in-the-nation Maine Rx program, which allowed the state to negotiate lower drug prices for seniors and others without prescription drug coverage a bill strongly opposed by the pharmaceutical industry. "I mean sometimes you have to say no to the special interests," she said. At 53, Pingree is a mother of three grown children, including House Majority Leader Hannah Pingree, who is in line to next year become speaker. A graduate of the College of the Atlantic, for 30 years Pingree has lived on the island of North Haven and proudly said she is a small business owner, who knows what it's like to make a payroll. Pingree started a yarn and knitting company on the island and is part-owner of a bed and breakfast there. Pingree refers to the 2008 election as "the most important one in our lifetime" with the war in Iraq, high energy costs, high health-care costs and increasing college tuitions, all urgent needs that must be addressed by Congress. "We need people who have had a range of experiences, whether it's owning a small business, or being a mother or taking on things like the pharmaceutical manufacturers on health care," she said. Ethan Strimling Ethan Strimling, who runs a social service agency for at-risk children and low-income families in Portland, has served since 2002 in the Senate, making a name for himself as chairman of the Labor Committee a platform he has used to successfully push for increases in the state's minimum wage. The key issue for him in his campaign for Congress is to improve the economy for the working class. "I thought the war would be the most important issue, and certainly the war must end," he said. "But I found quickly that the issue right now is our economy. How are we going to be able to stay in our homes and feed our families and retire comfortably?" Strimling, 40, is finishing up in the Senate after three terms. He has been a strong opponent of legalized gambling in the state, arguing that instead of offering economic opportunity, it drains money from the people who can least afford it. He also supports universal health care. Born and raised in New York City, Strimling went to the University of Maine at Orono for his undergraduate degree and earned a master's in education at Harvard University before making his way back to Maine. He often refers to his work at Portland West, an agency helping the poor in Portland, as shaping his agenda. "For 12 years, I have run an agency that works with families that are struggling," Strimling said, adding this year has been particularly tough on people because of the unprecedented price of oil. "When you get a call from somebody saying, My child is cold and I cannot heat my home,' it creates an activism in you that you can't let go of." "The economy is what scares me," he said. "If we don't do something about the economy today, I believe we are going to lose a generation. It's going to be the first time that our children are not going to do better than our parents, and that's not something I'm willing to stand by and allow happen."
