Maine governor refuses to talk to newspaper chain after it publishes unfavorable stories

UPDATE June 25: LePage made news again last week, saying during a live televised interview Thursday that Assistant Senate Majority Leader Troy Jackson (D-Allagash) "claims to be for the people, but he's the first one to give it to the people without providing Vaseline." LePage later said, "Dammit, that comment is not politically correct. But we've got to understand who this man is. This man is a bad person. He not only doesn't have a brain, he has a black heart. And so does the leadership" in the Legislature. LePage also appeared to mock Jackson's rural background and his profession as a logger, saying he "ought to go back in the woods and cut trees and let somebody with a brain come down here and do some work." (Read more)

Maine, which has the highest percentage of rural population in the country, could have a hard time getting information from its governor and his administration in the state's major newspapers. Republican Gov. Paul LePage, who has always had a rocky relationship with the news media, has responded to a series of unfavorable stories about his top environmental regulator by saying he will no longer speak to the Portland Press Herald, the Kennebec Journal and the Morning Sentinel, all part of MaineToday Media Inc., Steve Mistler reports for the Herald.

LePage spokesperson Adrienne Bennett told Mistler the administration would no longer participate in stories reported by the three newspapers, saying they "had made it clear that it opposed this administration." She said the papers could get responses from the administration from The Associated Press or through document requests using the Freedom of Access Act.

This isn't LePage's first run-in with newspapers, notes Mistler. In February, during a reading with schoolchildren, he said, "My greatest fear in the state of Maine: newspapers. I'm not a fan of newspapers." In 2012 he told junior high students that reading newspapers in Maine is "like paying somebody to tell you lies." LePage also said he'd like to punch a reporter during a taped interview, blasted the press in in his 2011 inauguration speech, and once stormed out of a news conference when he didn't like the line of questioning. (Read more)