Jacob Posik is the political director of Maine Civic Action and the director of legislative affairs of Maine Policy Institute.

There are landslides, there are blowouts and there are coronations.

On July 25, the Maine Democratic Party officially crowned former Senate President Troy Jackson as its nominee for the United States Senate. Jackson captured 566 of 571 delegate votes at the party’s emergency nominating convention, replacing Graham Platner after Platner’s spectacular political collapse. 

The margin wasn’t surprising. By the time delegates arrived in Bangor, the outcome had long been decided. The convention was simply the final act in a process that had already delivered Jackson the nomination before most Democrats even realized a contest was — allegedly — taking place.

The irony is hard to ignore. 

The party that lectures us about “defending democracy” ultimately entrusted one of the most consequential decisions in Maine politics to 571 insiders after more than 216,000 Mainers participated in the June Democratic primary. 

Just 0.26% of the people who cast ballots for a Democrat in June were empowered to determine who would challenge Sen. Susan Collins in November. 

To be fair, the Maine Democratic Party was operating under extraordinary circumstances. Replacing a nominee after a primary is exceedingly rare. But the party effectively had every legal right to establish whatever replacement process it wanted.

Ultimately, Maine Democrats opted for a system where delegate selection became the election. Once the deck was stacked internally in Jackson’s favor, the convention in Bangor became a formality. 

Other candidates might have mounted serious campaigns if more than 571 people were allowed to take part in the decision. Does this sound familiar? It should. 

Just two years ago, Democrats nationally found themselves in a similar predicament.

Former President Joe Biden’s disastrous debate performance crystallized concerns that had been building for months. His cognitive decline could no longer be dismissed. Polling showed Donald Trump would handily defeat him. Eventually, Biden did what many believed he should have done much sooner by withdrawing from the race.

At that point, Biden’s decision wasn’t controversial. But what happened next certainly was.   

Rather than opening the nomination to a robust competition among the Democratic Party’s brightest leaders, party elites moved with breathtaking speed to consolidate behind Vice President Kamala Harris. A virtual roll call of party delegates quickly ratified the predetermined outcome. 

No meaningful debates. No open contest. No opportunity for Democratic voters to evaluate competing visions for the future of their party.

The machine had spoken.

Maine Democrats just followed that same blueprint.

My understanding of democracy has always been that political power flowed upward from voters, not downward from party leadership. Yet rank-and-file Democrats continue to watch from the sidelines while a small handful of insiders determine who carries their banner. 

To be clear, this critique of the process is not meant to be an indictment of Jackson, necessarily. Perhaps he would have won in a statewide primary. But considering he barely beat Secretary of State Shenna Bellows and finished behind Dr. Nirav Shah in the Democratic gubernatorial primary — two candidates who also vied to replace Platner — it’s certainly not a given. 

Sadly, we’ll never know the answer because Democratic voters weren’t given the chance to decide.

When the judgment of 571 Mainers substitutes for the judgment of more than 216,000, something fundamentally undemocratic has occurred, even if everyone ultimately agrees with the result. 

Democrats constantly warn us that democracy is under threat. They speak passionately about protecting institutions, expanding voter participation and ensuring every voice is heard.

Those are admirable principles. But they lose their meaning when party brass repeatedly illustrates that those principles mean nothing.

When internal party decisions repeatedly bypass or exclude the will of ordinary voters — through lightning-fast virtual roll calls or insider delegate conventions — the message becomes clear: In the Democratic Party, only a select few closest to the levers of power make decisions for everyone else.

When push comes to shove, this is how both the national and Maine Democratic parties operate. 

Maine Democrats have every reason to be frustrated. Not because Jackson is the nominee, but because so few had the opportunity to decide whether he should be. Perhaps they should even fear Jackson will face a similar fate as Kamala Harris because of this process. 

Call this nomination efficient, practical or even necessary under extraordinary circumstances. 

But don’t call it democracy. That’s not what democracy looks like.