Last Tuesday night, during his primary victory speech in Blue Hill, Maine, the scandal-plagued Graham Platner repeatedly insisted that his Senate candidacy reflected a larger phenomenon beyond his enticing yet deeply flawed character—one that, he seemed to suggest, transcended the allegations about sexting or creepy behavior or whatever. “They fail to understand that this is not about me at all. This is a movement about us,” he said, evoking an Obama-esque message and the ancient mandate of populists everywhere. But instead of emanating hope for better days ahead, the undercurrent of Platner’s message was laced with fury—the animating message of his insurgent campaign. “We have watched this state become virtually unlivable for working-class people, and it makes me deeply angry,” the oyster farmer said in his launch video last year, piloting a boat in a dirty blue hoodie as he spoke imploringly to the camera.