Maine's new Democratic Senate nominee Troy Jackson is raising his two children with a woman who is also his second cousin, and a growing list of financial and ethical questions is following him onto the ballot.

Days after Jackson secured 566 delegates at the Maine Democratic convention in Bangor to win the party's nomination, reports surfaced Thursday that he and his longtime partner, Lana Pelletier, share a set of great-grandparents. Both grew up in Allagash, a tiny community in Aroostook County in Maine's far north. Genealogical records cited by reporter Steve Robinson confirmed the familial connection.

Jackson, 58, the former president of the Maine Senate, was tapped last week to challenge Republican Sen. Susan Collins. He replaced Graham Platner, who exited the race earlier this month after a former girlfriend accused him of sexual assault, an allegation Platner denied. Jackson has not publicly addressed the report about his relationship with Pelletier.

His campaign offered a brief response. A spokesperson told the New York Post:

"Personal attacks on Troy's family are shameful and desperate."

The statement did not dispute the genealogical findings or answer any of the financial disclosure questions now attached to Jackson's candidacy.

Jackson never married Pelletier, and that creates a disclosure gap

The cousin question is unusual, but the financial transparency problem it exposes may matter more to voters. Under Senate rules, candidates and sitting members must file detailed disclosures covering their own income, assets, and liabilities, along with those of a spouse. Maine does not recognize common-law marriage. Because Jackson and Pelletier never legally wed, despite older official references that described her as his wife, it remains unclear whether his disclosures would need to account for her finances at all.

As of this week, Jackson had not filed a Senate financial disclosure or requested an extension, Townhall's Matt Vespa reported. Sen. Collins, by contrast, files disclosures that account for her husband's finances, the standard practice for any candidate running for the seat.

The arrangement raises a straightforward question: did Jackson structure his personal life in a way that conveniently sidesteps the transparency requirements every other Senate candidate follows? No one in his campaign has answered it.

Back taxes, a residency complaint, and reports of berating women lawmakers

The cousin report lands on top of a pile of controversies that have accumulated around Jackson in a matter of weeks. The Bangor Daily News reported that Jackson paid roughly $4,600 in late state income taxes last year after a tax lien over debt dating back to 2020. A candidate asking voters to trust him with federal fiscal policy settled his own state tax bill only after the government put a lien on what he owed.

A Republican lawmaker filed an ethics complaint in 2023 alleging Jackson misrepresented his residency. The complaint said Jackson bought a home in Augusta, the state capital, while continuing to list Allagash as his residence on legislative filings. The outcome of that complaint has not been made public.

Earlier this month, a separate report alleged that Jackson berated women lawmakers during his tenure leading the Maine Senate. The details of those allegations and whether any of the lawmakers involved have spoken on the record remain unclear.

For a candidate who has held his nomination for less than a week, the volume of unresolved questions is remarkable. And Maine Democrats chose him after their previous nominee's campaign collapsed under sexual misconduct allegations.

Democrats' Maine Senate bid keeps finding new ways to falter

Jackson was supposed to be the safe replacement. Platner's exit left the party scrambling to field a credible challenger to Collins, and Jackson, a former Senate president with deep roots in rural Maine, seemed like a steadying choice. Instead, each passing week has delivered a new problem.

The relationship between Jackson and Pelletier is legal under Maine law. Second-cousin relationships carry no statutory prohibition in the state, and residents of isolated communities in the North Maine Woods have long intermarried within a small population. The New York Post noted that the arrangement is reportedly not uncommon in the region. None of that changes the disclosure and transparency issues the relationship has surfaced.

The party's broader Senate prospects have already taken a hit. The Maine collapse has narrowed Democrats' path to a Senate majority, and Jackson's growing list of liabilities does nothing to reverse that trajectory.

Meanwhile, the recruiting operation that produced Platner has drawn its own scrutiny. The strategist who recruited the disgraced candidate faced his own sexual misconduct complaints, a pattern that raises questions about the judgment of the people building Maine Democrats' Senate bench.

No disclosure, no answers, no accountability

Jackson has not filed his financial disclosure. He has not addressed the genealogical records. He has not explained the residency complaint or offered a full accounting of his tax history. He has not responded to the reports about his conduct toward women colleagues.

What he has done is send a spokesperson to call the questions "shameful and desperate." That is not an answer. It is a deflection, and voters deciding whether to trust this man with a Senate seat deserve better.

Collins, who has held the seat since 1997, files her disclosures on time and accounts for her spouse's finances. Jackson cannot even confirm whether he considers himself obligated to do the same. The contrast speaks for itself.

Maine Democrats went looking for a clean candidate after their last one imploded. What they found was a nominee with unpaid taxes, a residency ethics complaint, allegations of mistreating women lawmakers, a missing financial disclosure, and a family arrangement that conveniently blurs the lines of Senate transparency rules. At some point, the party has to ask whether the problem is the candidates, or the people choosing them.