Maine Governor Paul LePage goes buck wild after getting hit with accusations of racism

Impact

Maine's racist governor Paul LePage is in trouble for being a racist — and for leaving a profanity-laced voicemail threatening the state lawmaker who allegedly called him out on it.

During a Wednesday night town hall meeting, LePage doubled down on controversial comments he made in January, when he attributed Maine's drug problem to men from out of state with names like "D-Money, Smoothie [and] Shifty," who "sell their heroin, [then] go back home.

"Incidentally, half the time they impregnate a young, white girl before they leave, which is a real sad thing because then we have another issue we have to deal with down the road," he said at the time.

Speaking to the crowd at the town hall meeting on Wednesday, LePage said he had a book full of photos of drug busts in Maine, according to the Portland Press Herald. "I will tell you that 90-plus percent of those pictures in my book, and it's a three-ringed binder, are black and Hispanic people from Waterbury, Conn., the Bronx and Brooklyn," he said.

Robert F. Bukaty/AP

But when a TV reporter implied that some were still calling the remarks racist — seemingly suggesting that Democratic Rep. Drew Gattine might be among the dissenters — LePage lost it, according to the Press Herald.

In a voicemail to Gattine that the paper obtained in full, LePage challenged the state lawmaker, who denied ever having made the claims in the first place.

"Mr. Gattine, this is Gov. Paul Richard LePage," the recording says. "I would like to talk to you about your comments about my being a racist, you cocksucker. I want to talk to you. I want you to prove that I'm a racist. I've spent my life helping black people and you little son-of-a-bitch, socialist cocksucker. You ... I need you to, just friggin. I want you to record this and make it public because I am after you. Thank you."

In a subsequent interview with the Press Herald and local television station WMTW, LePage defended threatening Gattine and also upped the ante, saying that he wished he could duel him a la Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton:

When a snot-nosed little guy from Westbrook calls me a racist, now I'd like him to come up here because, tell you right now, I wish it were 1825. And we would have a duel, that's how angry I am, and I would not put my gun in the air, I guarantee you, I would not be (Alexander) Hamilton. I would point it right between his eyes, because he is a snot-nosed little runt and he has not done a damn thing since he's been in this Legislature to help move the state forward.

For now, LePage will have to content himself with 2016's equivalent of a duel: talking shit about your foe to the press behind their back.