Orr’s Island resident Bernard “Ben” Porter said running for office was the last thing on his mind when he retired recently from his second career as a cybersecurity expert.
But when local party representatives came calling, Porter, who is also a retired U.S. Army officer, said he didn’t hesitate to volunteer.
“My view on public service is, if you’re asked to serve, the correct answer is always yes,” he said in an interview.
Porter will be the only Republican on the June primary ballot for Senate District 23, according to the Maine Secretary of State’s Office. The filing deadline was March 16.
Maine Senate President Matthea “Mattie” Daughtry, a three-term senator and first-term leader of the chamber, currently holds the seat and is unopposed in the Democratic primary. Previously a four-term state representative, Daughtry won her last race by 38 percentage points.
Porter and Daughtry appear poised to face off in the November general election. District 23 includes all of Harpswell, Brunswick, Chebeague Island, Freeport, and Pownal, along with part of Yarmouth.
Porter has lived full time at the south end of Orr’s Island for six years, and “on and off” for the past 26. He comes from a family of service members and joined the Army in 1990, in the lead-up to the Gulf War. He ended up making the military his first career.
“When the Gulf War kicked off, I was 24,” Porter said. “I was pouring concrete, and I ran right down to the recruiting station and signed up. I discovered I liked it, and I was good at it.”
He went on to serve in a variety of roles and locations, including patrols in the Korean Demilitarized Zone, fighting Iraqi forces under Saddam Hussein, and working for U.S. Army Special Operations Command back in the United States.
Porter, who has a bachelor’s degree in public management and a Master of Business Administration in finance from Johns Hopkins University, said he is concerned that many high school graduates can no longer pass basic tests such as the military’s entrance exam.
Porter said Maine schools are spending too much time on social-emotional learning and not enough on basic skills such as reading and math. He said schools should refocus on core academics to build stronger mastery of the fundamentals.
He also opposes Maine’s rules allowing transgender students to use bathrooms and locker rooms, and compete on sports teams, based on gender identity. Porter said access should be restricted based on biological sex.
When speaking with constituents, Porter said their No. 1 concern has been “taxes, taxes, taxes.” He noted that Maine’s General Fund budget has grown from roughly $7.2 billion at the end of former Republican Gov. Paul LePage’s tenure in 2018 to about $11.9 billion under Democratic Gov. Janet Mills.
“All spending is taxation,” Porter said. “The government doesn’t have any money; it has money that it takes from the citizens. So one way or another, every dollar the government spends, we’re paying for, today or tomorrow, directly or indirectly.”
Porter said he favors reducing government spending by targeting instances of “waste, fraud and abuse,” which he believes are rampant. One area where he does support spending is law enforcement, particularly efforts to crack down on traffickers of fentanyl and other hard drugs.
Porter said he is a strong supporter of Maine’s working waterfront, which is under pressure from coastal development, damaging storms and rising costs. He hopes to help preserve marine jobs by working with people in the community to develop “a bottom-up planning strategy.”
“I think whatever policy is presented is best if it originates from the actual stakeholders themselves,” he said.
To help alleviate Mainers’ concerns about affordability, Porter recommends focusing heavily on cutting energy costs.
“We need to make it easier to bring affordable energy into the state, and also to generate it within our state,” he said. He said the state has “great potential” to draw on hydropower and nuclear power.
Harpswell’s other representative in the Maine Legislature, second-term state Rep. Cheryl Golek, is also set to face a local challenger in November. Republican Braeden Webber, of Harpswell, has filed paperwork to run against Golek, a Harpswell Democrat, in House District 99. The district includes all of Harpswell and the northeastern part of Brunswick. Attempts to arrange an interview with Webber were unsuccessful.
