Paul R. LePage, the former two-term Republican governor of Maine, is planning to seek his old office again in 2022, announcing on Monday “I am in” despite having left the state for sunny Florida after his previous term ended and declaring himself done with politics. Mr. LePage, 72, was succeeded as governor by a Democrat, Janet Mills, but the state’s term-limits law allows him to run for a third nonconsecutive term, which he has signaled his interest in for almost a year. A Republican who shunned protocol and employed incendiary rhetoric before former President Donald J. Trump’s arrival on the political scene, Mr. LePage left office with a 40 percent approval rating. In 2011, he said he would skip events for Martin Luther King Jr. Day and told the N.A.A.C.P. to “kiss my butt.” That was just the first in a series of inflammatory remarks on race from Mr. LePage during his governorship.

Source: New York Times July 06, 2021 18:11 UTC