ME: IPR Interviews Independent State Rep. Ben Chipman

From Independent Political Report:

Two nights ago Ross Levin and I interviewed Maine’s newest Independent state legislator, Ben Chipman. This previous article has a bit of background:

Ben Chipman is a Green Party activist in Maine and was elected to the state legislature this year as an independent… Chipman has been a Green Party activist for a long time, including being an aide to Maine’s only former Green state legislator and a member of the Portland Charter Commission. He was the only Green-affiliated independent … elected to state office in the entire country this year.

We began by asking about Mr. Chipman’s campaign strategy and how he became an Independent, rather than Green, candidate. He explains that “various circumstances” came into play when it came time to file, and coupled with his late entry into the race he was unable to run as a Green. Instead, the longtime Green Party activist filed as an Independent.

He found as he began to campaign that the Independent label gained greater traction than the Green Party label had in the past. Mr Chipman explained that the Green Party had run candidates in this district in the past, but none had come closer than 400-500 votes away from victory. He began to emphasize his status as an Independent candidate in campaign literature . . .