Community Voices for Change - 30 mins - First Aired July 6, 2026
WMPG-FM. Univ of So. Maine - Weekly - Mondays - 1:00 PM
Producer & Host:  Richard Rudolph, PhD.

This installment is an interview of Ethan Strimling who is a former mayor of Portland, Maine.  He talked about the recent primary election in Maine and how he failed to recognize that the three progressive candidates who were running for Governor were solidly ahead and that progressives would be splitting their vote on the first ballot between Troy Jackson, Hanna Pingree and Shenna Bellows.  He mentioned that once he figured it out,  it was clear that one of them was likely to emerge as the winner  because of rank choice voting.  The only question was  whether these candidates would have the courage to join arms to cross-endorse and actively encourage their supporters to vote for the other two as their second and third choice while also pledging not to attack each other.   Fortunately within two weeks of the election these three candidates cross-endorsed, and actively encouraged their supporters to vote for the other two as their second and third choice while also pledging not to attack each other.   Fully 32,000 of Bellows second place votes went to Jackson and Pingree with less than 10,000 going to Nirav Shah catapulting Pingree into first place even before the final round.  When Jackson and Bellow's votes were then distributed,  Hannah Pingree got another 26.000 votes giving her a double digit win over Shaw.