Seacoast Online - "Pingree: Democrat for Congress"

News Article

Seacoast Online - "Pingree: Democrat for Congress"

Chellie Pingree is facing a crowded primary field of potentially six opponents for the 1st Congressional District seat being vacated by Tom Allen, but she's not fazed in the least.

There's reason why. She's come to know the likes of Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, Sen. Barack Obama and other Washington power brokers. She's a longtime Mainer who once started a cottage industry at her North Haven island home. She's fought the pharmaceutical companies all the way to the Supreme Court. And she's a female Democrat at a time when another female Democrat is coming out on top of a slew of candidates for U.S. president.
Related Stories

* Cote: Democrat for Congress
* Lawrence: Democrat for Congress
* Scontras: Republican for Congress
* Meet Maine's candidates for U.S. Congress

"It's traditional in Maine to have a crowded field. There's so few seats and there's a lot of good people," said Pingree. "But I believe I have the name recognition and the experience to win. And I intend to win."

Pingree's name, while perhaps not quite of the household variety, is arguably the most familiar to District 1 residents. In 2000, when she was Maine's Senate majority leader, she filed landmark prescription-drug legislation, the first in the nation to leverage lower prescription costs for the state's residents.

She said she fought one by one to persuade her colleagues to back the plan, which eventually was signed into law and successfully withstood U.S. Supreme Court scrutiny after pharmaceutical companies challenged it.

Buoyed by the attendant publicity and accolades, she decided to run against U.S. Sen. Susan Collins in 2002. She admits she became pegged by some as a one-issue candidate, but she said she's "learned a tremendous amount since then. And I cannot tell you how vastly different the political climate is now. The Democrats are in control of the House and Senate. The issues are very different (than in 2002)."

And Pingree is better versed in those issues than her opponents, she said, because she's the only one with experience in Washington. For the past four years, she has been the president and chief executive officer of Common Cause, whose first president was Ralph Nader.

"I gained the experience and insight to know how to get things done in Washington," she said. "I got to know a lot of people in Congress, and they know me. I see that as a benefit."

Pingree returned to Maine in February with the announced purpose of running for the seat of U.S. Rep. Tom Allen, who is taking on his own challenge of Collins in 2008.

She makes no bones about her disenchantment with Congress on several key issues, such as health care.

"People are so angry that nothing's been done that they don't even bring it up any more. They've gotten their hopes up and had them dashed, and they're saying, 'What's the use?'" she said. "If the Democrats take the White House and they maintain Congress and don't do anything about health care, people will say, 'Why even bother being engaged?'"

She said her time at Common Cause taught her how to fight effectively for issues, a skill she'll bring to bear if she's sent to Washington. That will hold her in good stead, she said, if the war in Iraq continues into 2009.

Pingree, who declared her opposition to the war back in 2002 during her run against Collins, said it is one of the most important reasons she is running.

She said she was "very disappointed" with the House for backing down from withdrawal deadlines after pressure from the White House.

"That was an enormous mistake," she said. "It's shocking that the president can have such a low approval rating, and that people are overwhelmingly against the war, and the Congress can't stand up to him."

Other issues that matter to her, as a Mainer, are U.S. energy policy, the environment and, as a former organic farmer, food safety.

Pingree was joined at the interview by Jackie Potter, Allen's former chief of staff and a longtime Democratic operative in Maine who has joined the campaign.

"I've seen it all, and I've become very cynical about politics," Potter said. "I was going to sit this election out until I learned Chellie was running. She gives me hope."

Source