After Democrat Graham Platner withdrew amid intense pressure from party leaders worried he was headed for defeat, Maine’s Senate race largely faded from the national spotlight. One of the few developments to draw attention afterward was the state party’s process for selecting a replacement nominee: Troy Jackson, who had been backed by Platner and was chosen a couple of weeks later.

Another revelation, however, has attracted far more awkward attention. Jackson, a former Maine Senate president who has received the endorsement of the Maine DSA, is romantically involved with his second cousin, and the couple has children together, as RedState previously reported.

At the time, my colleague Teri Christoph noted that “shacking up and procreating with your cousin isn’t illegal in Maine, but, let’s be honest, it’s a little weird in this day and age. But, hey, he found a unique way to out-Platner Platner.”

As it happens, that assessment may have been even more on the mark than it first appeared, for reasons that will become clear shortly.