The allegations against Platner could constitute gross sexual assault, a felony crime in Maine law used to prosecute rape, according to a Maine criminal defense lawyer.

The recent sexual assault allegations against Graham Platner aren’t just the political flashpoint that forced a rising populist Democrat to suspend a major Senate campaign. They also potentially amount to criminal conduct.

Jenny Racicot, 41, had been casually dating Platner for about two years when he came to the home where she was staying in 2021 and sexually assaulted her, while she repeatedly told him to stop, according to allegations she made in interviews with Politico and CNN.

Those allegations could constitute gross sexual assault, a felony crime in Maine law used to prosecute rape, according to William T. Bly, a Maine criminal defense lawyer. However, he said Racicot, who didn’t report the incident to law enforcement in 2021, would need to decide now that she wants to report it.

“If you take a look at the statutes, you can see all the different ways it could be charged, but it is gross sexual assault,” Bly said.

“A lot of it’s going to come down to victim credibility and what, if any, corroborating evidence can they get?” Bly added.

Racicot said the assault took place in the village of Marlboro, which is in Maine’s Hancock County.

In a lengthy email to USA TODAY, Hancock County District Attorney Bob Granger said his office cannot comment on whether any criminal investigation exists, noting that Maine law criminalizes unlawfully disseminating information from an investigative record.

Granger added that his office wouldn’t ordinarily open an investigation unless a victim makes a formal sexual assault complaint to law enforcement for the area where the crime happened, and that victims of sexual assaults may be reluctant to move forward criminally for “a number of valid reasons,” including “horrendous emotional and psychological pain.”

However, Granger said his office takes formal complaints seriously.

“If a victim exercises the courage to come forward to law enforcement with credible allegations, we owe it to both them and the general public to carefully examine those claims,” he said.

Shannon Moss, a spokesperson for Maine’s Department of Public Safety, told USA TODAY in an email that the Maine State Police haven’t received or investigated any criminal complaints involving Platner. USA TODAY also left a voice message at the Hancock County Sheriff’s Office seeking information on any complaints.

USA TODAY was unable to reach Racicot for comment.

Ryan Barto, the communications director for Platner’s campaign, didn’t respond to a request for comment, but Platner has previously denied that he sexually assaulted anyone.

“This is all false. The things that have been claimed did not happen. It’s not real,” Platner said in a video posted to Instagram July 8, in which he didn’t address the specifics of Racicot’s account, but said her allegations were surfacing in the media in an effort to get his name off the ballot.

“Accusations are supposed to be the beginning of things, not the end,” he said.

Here’s a look at what kinds of charges could be in play if a complaint were lodged and prosecutors chose to move forward, what penalties they could involve, and what a defense might look like:

Prosecuting rape in Maine

Gross sexual assault, Maine’s central felony rape statute, can be prosecuted in many different forms, depending on the nature of the allegations. For instance, if a defendant compelled another person to engage in a sex act, the person could face a “Class A” assault felony charge, Maine’s most serious class of gross sexual assault.

Other forms of sexual assault in Maine, such as getting someone to engage in a sex act by threat or being criminally negligent about whether the other person consented, amount to lower-class felonies.

Racicot alleged that Platner was heavily intoxicated when he entered her home uninvited and ignored her repeated pleas for him to stop. She told Politico she cut off contact after telling him the incident was not consensual.

If prosecutors were considering gross sexual assault charges against Platner, the time that has passed since the alleged assault wouldn’t prohibit them from moving forward. Maine allows prosecutors to bring gross sexual assault felony charges anytime within 20 years of the offense.

What kind of penalties could Platner face if charged and convicted?

Defendants convicted of the most serious form of gross sexual assault – Class A felonies – can be imprisoned for up to 30 years. Class B and Class C gross sexual felonies allow judges to sentence a defendant to up to 10 years and five years in prison, respectively.

Maximum penalties often don’t reflect the actual penalties defendants receive from a judge. In Maine, judges take various factors into account when determining the appropriate sentence, such as defendants’ age, the nature of the underlying crime, their criminal history, and evidence that reflects on their character.

“It’s not just the classification of the crime, but what are the details that come out,” Bly said. “There’s so many different things to look at.”

What kinds of defenses could Platner raise?

Bly said Platner’s potential defense, if he were to face charges, would be driven by details in the case that may currently be largely unknown.

Still, one potential line of defense is already clear: Platner has suggested that the timing of Racicot’s account is intentional. The allegations emerging just days before a July 13 deadline to remove him as Maine’s Democratic Senate nominee, Platner said, indicate they were politically motivated.

“This was the last week to try to get me off of the ballot. And that’s why this is occurring,” Platner said in his July 8 Instagram video message.

“I’m sure a defense would be that this was politically motivated, the person had a personal issue and an ax to grind,” Bly said.

Racicot told Politico she didn’t go public earlier in part because she believes in Platner’s platform.

“One of the reasons I didn’t come forward sooner was the huge moral conflict that I had between supporting his politics, but not supporting him as a person,” she said.

With all the years gone by, there might also be a lack of physical evidence for prosecutors to present in court, and questions from the defense not just about an accuser’s motive, but her memory.

“The longer in time someone waits to bring allegations, especially when they’re already adults when they occurred, tends to weigh against, I think, the credibility potentially of the alleged victim,” Bly said.

Still, corroboration could persuade prosecutors they have a strong enough case, Bly said. They may be able to point to accounts from people Racicot spoke with after the alleged crime occurred.

CNN spoke with two people who said that Racicot previously disclosed that Platner sexually assaulted her. She spoke with a then-boyfriend in 2023 and a close friend in late August of 2025, around the time Platner launched his campaign. The former boyfriend said Racicot disclosed Platner’s identity to him after Platner launched his campaign. The friend said Racicot initially referred to her assailant as an “oysterman,” but later shared that it was Platner.

According to Platner’s campaign website, he started working on his friend’s small oyster farm in 2018 and eventually took over the oyster farm.

Governor Maura Healey said in a statement that she was “deeply disappointed” by the president’s decision and would keep fighting to secure federal dollars for Massachusetts.

“Our first responders, public works crews, and local communities worked around the clock to keep people safe and begin recovery,” she said. “They did their job, and now President Trump needs to do his.”

Climate advocates say the denial — which came on the same day that Trump rejected three other Democrat-led states’ requests for winter storm relief — reflects the administration’s politicization of disaster aid.

“Communities in Massachusetts and everywhere deserve a federal government that makes decisions for all people, and not just those that they perceive as having voted for them,” said Kate Sinding Daly, senior vice president for law and policy at the Conservation Law Foundation.

The president can declare a major disaster when a natural catastrophe is shown to have exceeded a state’s capabilities and resources. An analysis conducted by POLITICO in March found that it is three times harder for blue states than red states to get disaster funding under Trump.

According to the analysis, the president has approved just 23 percent of disaster funding requests from states with a Democratic governor and two Democratic senators, compared with 89 percent of requests from states represented by Republicans — an unprecedented discrepancy.

The analysis also found that Trump takes an average of 80 days to respond to disaster requests from Democrat-led states, compared to 39 for Republicans.

Abigail Jackson, a White House spokeswoman, strongly disputed that the Trump administration was politicizing decisions on disaster relief. She did not comment on why Trump denied Massachusetts’ request.

“President Trump provides a more thorough review of disaster declaration requests than any Administration has before him,” she said in a statement. She said the president was ensuring tax dollars were used by states “to supplement — not substitute, their obligation to respond to and recover from disasters.”

Former Washington governor Jay Inslee described the president’s approach to disaster aid as “outrageous, immoral, and illegal.” During Trump’s first term, the president reportedly ignored Inslee’s request for wildfire relief because of a personal dispute.

“He will consciously, willfully, and joyfully deny people aid who are at the most difficult moments of their lives,” said Inslee, who co-chairs the advocacy group Climate Power. “It is so infuriating to see an American president use disaster aid as a cudgel.”

The Healey administration announced in early April that it had requested a major disaster declaration for the February blizzard. It sought to reimburse state agencies and local governments in the southeastern part of the state for snow removal and other storm-related costs. The blizzard downed hundreds of power lines and trees, and nearly 300,000 people lost power at the peak of the storm.

Last week, Trump rejected disaster declaration requests from four Democrat-led states who had sought aid for the February storm: Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New York, and New Jersey. The president’s decision came just days after he approved aid for six Republican-led states.

“Trump is either politicizing disaster declarations or he is attacking states where it snows — neither is good,” wrote Senator Ed Markey in a social media post. “The February blizzard was costly for our communities, and Trump must approve the Commonwealth’s need for assistance.”

Senator Elizabeth Warren said a statement that the president’s decision was “cruel and makes clear he doesn’t see himself as a president for all Americans.”

“Communities in Massachusetts were hit by one of the worst storms we’ve seen in decades, and instead of sending a lifeline, the President is leaving everyday Americans out to dry,” she added.

Rhode Island officials also slammed the Trump administration for denying the state’s request. The winter storm hit the state with the intensity of a Category 2 hurricane. Providence had to cap spending for the rest of the fiscal year after record-setting snow.

The state’s congressional delegation — Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, Senator Jack Reed, Representative Seth Magaziner, and Representative Gabe Amo — wrote a letter calling on the president to reverse the denial. A preliminary assessment found more than $19 million in damages across the state, the letter said.

“You chose to leave Rhode Islanders out in the cold,” the lawmakers wrote.

Meanwhile, the president approved a major disaster declaration for the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe in Massachusetts related to the February blizzard. (Federally recognized tribal governments can directly request a disaster declaration.)

Additionally, FEMA announced on Thursday that it had approved nearly $5.7 million for projects to reduce future disaster costs in New England, including more than $1 million for Massachusetts projects combating flooding.

Kate Selig can be reached at kate.selig@globe.com. Follow her on X @kate_selig.

A pair of trans athletes in New Hampshire have dismissed their lawsuit to challenge the state law that protects girls’ sports after the U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark Title IX ruling on June 30.

The trans teenage plaintiffs, Parker Tirrell and Iris Turmelle, originally filed the lawsuit in 2024 to challenge a current New Hampshire state law prohibiting trans athletes from participating in girls’ sports. The lawsuit later expanded to add President Donald Trump’s administration to the defendants after Trump signed the “No Men in Women’s Sports” executive order on Feb. 5, 2025.

The lawyers for the trans athletes claimed Trump’s executive order, along with parts of a Jan. 20 executive order that forbids federal money from being used to “promote gender ideology,” subjects the teens and all transgender girls to discrimination in violation of federal equal protection guarantees and their rights under Title IX.

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The U.S. District Court for the District of New Hampshire then ruled last year that female athletes represented by Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) attorneys were permitted to intervene in the case to defend the state’s women’s sports law and the administration’s executive orders.

Now, after the Supreme Court’s landmark ruling, which protects state laws that ensure only females compete in girls’ sports, there is no room for the trans teens to fight the law in New Hampshire.

“Women and girls deserve privacy, safety, and equal opportunities. That can’t happen when males are competing in women’s sports, taking spots on women’s athletic teams, and winning women’s championships,” ADF Senior Counsel and Vice President of Litigation Strategy Jonathan Scruggs said in a statement provided to Fox News Digital.

USA POWERLIFTING, ONCE IN TRANS ATHLETE LAWSUIT, SUPPORTS SCOTUS RULING: ‘LAW HAS CAUGHT UP WITH THE SCIENCE’

“President Trump’s executive orders and New Hampshire’s law recognize common sense and track Title IX, the federal law that ensures equal opportunities for women in athletics. We are grateful this case is coming to an end and that New Hampshire is free to protect its female athletes.”

Fox News Digital has reached out to Tirrell and Turmelle’s attorneys at GLBTQ Legal Advocates & Defenders (GLAD) for a response.

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The SCOTUS rulings in West Virginia v. B.P.J. and Little v. Hecox, the high court upheld state laws requiring student-athletes to compete on sports teams that correspond with their biological sex at birth rather than their gender identity, in a 6-3 decision.

However, there are still 23 states, including California, New York and Massachusetts, that don’t have any such laws, and some of those have laws to protect trans athletes in girls’ sports.