Jake Auchincloss

Independents and patriotic Republicans who revere the freedoms granted to all in our Constitution should consider the harm and damage President Trump’s administration has already brought to individuals, treaties, and countries, including our own.

A vote for Republican incumbent Collins could result in harm to the very people who cast that vote. Think about the consequences, Mainers, and please vote for Platner, the Democrat.

Iris Kaufman

Peabody

To Representative Jake Auchincloss: I respect your objection to Graham Platner’s Nazi-themed tattoo, which the candidate recently had covered up. But please remember that your first and foremost job is to represent your constituents, of which I am one. I am appalled that you would fail to endorse a Democrat running against a Republican senator, Susan Collins, who with her support of the Trump administration has enabled our current transition to an authoritarian government.

The stakes of this election could not be higher. Congressman, it’s not about you.

Lisa Rucinski

Newton

I certainly do not blame Representative Jake Auchincloss for being offended by the tattoo that Maine Senate candidate Graham Platner formerly displayed on his chest. However, I find it difficult to square that offense with Auchincloss’s refusal to support Platner’s bid for the Senate, a decision that will undoubtedly boost incumbent Senator Susan Collins.

As for Collins, I hope Auchincloss will consider the following:

She voted to confirm Justice Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court. Her vote was important because she always alleged that she favored abortion rights, and she backed up her vote with a 45-minute floor speech contending that Kavanaugh viewed Roe v. Wade as settled law. Several years after Collins’s vote, Kavanaugh voted to overturn Roe v. Wade.

By voting to align with Republicans in the organization of the Senate, Collins allowed President Trump and Republican leadership to pass the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. Passage of this bill will reduce federal health care funding by more that $1 trillion over 10 years and cause approximately 10 million Americans to lose health insurance.

These are just two of an endless list of consequences that derive from the last reelection of Collins. I would request that Auchincloss ask himself whether a poor woman in a red state who can no longer access reproductive care, or whether a middle-class family who can no longer afford health insurance because the subsidies formerly available under the Affordable Care Act are gone, would believe his concern over Platner’s tattoo is justified.

Frankly, I find Auchincloss’s actions more perplexing than anything we have learned about Platner. I, for one, will continue to support Platner’s attempt to force Collins’s retirement before she does more harm.

Marc Springer

Brookline

Columnist Joan Vennochi notes that when Representative Jake Auchincloss first ran for Congress in 2020, he apologized for a snarky comment he made as a 22-year-old. As a candidate he hoped that voters would decide that his “record of service” made up for a “tone-deaf” social media post of 11 years earlier.

Auchincloss should realize that Graham Platner — a fellow member of the armed forces, who served several combat tours, in Iraq and Afghanistan, protecting our country — did something he was not proud of while he was young and has admitted the mistake.

Auchincloss owes him not only an apology but also an endorsement in his race for the Senate in Maine. Platner is the leading Democratic candidate to face Republican Susan Collins, who consistently supports President Trump, most recently endorsing funding Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the travesty of the SAVE America Act. Our American democracy depends on Platner defeating her.

Bill Bannon

Brunswick, Maine

I voted for US Representative Jake Auchincloss. However, I do take exception to his dressing down of Graham Platner, Democratic candidate for senator in Maine.

Platner was a Marine in his early 20s, on a break from combat with a few of his buddies, who was out drinking in Croatia when he ended up getting a tattoo that, in sober circumstances, he probably would have declined. Now, nearly 20 years later, the Senate candidate is being told by Auchincloss that he finds the tattoo and Platner’s commentary about it to be personally disqualifying.

Really! I would like anyone to tell me that at age 41 they would do the same dumb things they did 20 years earlier. I think Auchincloss needs to walk back his negative comments and issue an apology. No one is perfect.

Annie Charbonnier

Norfolk

Perhaps Representative Jake Auchincloss is not aware that the skull and crossbones is a common symbol in many contexts (“Covered-up Nazi tattoo shadows Senate bid,” Metro, May 28). It is used in children’s comic books about pirates, it appears on Halloween cards and costumes, it has appeared in political cartoons, it is used on various products to indicate danger of poisoning. It is widely used as a symbol of death or danger.

While the swastika is a symbol that is unequivocally associated with the Nazi regime, even that image previously occurred in South Asian art long before the 20th century.

I am among what I suspect are many who were not aware until recently that the skull and crossbones was also the symbol chosen by a division of the Nazi military. It is also a symbol that was chosen by Graham Platner for a tattoo while on leave from a tour of duty in places where people were shooting at him with the intent to kill. Has it occurred to Auchincloss, a fellow veteran, that a person who has just left such a situation might want to wear a symbol of death in defiance of his own encounter?

The congressman should stick to Massachusetts politics and focus on his own reelection. The voters in Maine can decide what they think about Platner’s personal history and future plans.

Paul M. Martin

Springfield

Joan Vennochi asks, “Will it be Platner or Collins to the Senate? And how much should a tattoo from two decades ago influence the decision?”

The late Barney Frank, one of the most astute and admired Massachusetts politicians, essentially answered that question recently when he said that progressive Democrats have “embraced an agenda that goes beyond what’s politically acceptable. Until we separate ourselves from that agenda, we don’t win.”

I think that Representative Jake Auchincloss should dispense with further statements and let Graham Platner win through the very practical voters of Maine.

Dan Roble

Medfield

Am I the only one who wonders whether Representative Jake Auchincloss opposes Graham Platner because Senator Susan Collins is the recipient of considerable support from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, which is also the largest source of support for Auchincloss?

Stephen McKnight

Needham