A senior House Democrat is joining the growing chorus of critics questioning Senate candidate Graham Platner’s claim that he was unaware of his tattoo’s Nazi origins.
“There’s no way he didn’t know what the tattoo was,” Rep. Brad Schneider, D-Ill., said Friday in remarks reported by Punchbowl News. “Own it and move on.
“He’s not willing to do that,” Schneider, the chairman of House Democrats’ largest caucus, lamented.
Schneider’s comments make him one of the most high-profile Democrats to criticize the Maine Senate hopeful, who has also faced mounting scrutiny over sending sexually explicit messages to other women while newly married, a decades-long history of offensive social media posts and alleged abuse in previous romantic relationships.
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Platner, a far-left populist, is vying to unseat Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, in one of the most hotly contested races of November’s midterm elections. He is Maine Democrats’ presumptive nominee, though some party insiders have expressed doubts about the viability of his candidacy amid a string of scandals.
Schneider’s public criticism came after The New York Times reported Thursday that several of Platner’s ex-girlfriends said the Senate hopeful knew about his tattoo’s Nazi-linked design.
One of the women, Lyndsey Fifield, told the Times Platner taught her the words behind the black skull-and-crossbones tattoo, referring to it as “my Totenkopf.”
“He would joke about it being a Nazi tattoo,” Fifield said, adding that Platner said he chose the tattoo because of his belief that his unit shared similarities to the Nazi SS paramilitary forces.
Platner vigorously denied Fifield’s account during an interview with MS NOW’s Chris Hayes on Thursday. But he struggled to answer when pressed about how Fifield sent a text to friends saying he had a Nazi-linked tattoo in August 2025, when he first publicly disclosed it two months later during an October podcast episode of “Pod Save America.”
“How does she know it’s a Nazi tattoo in August of last year, and you don’t know it’s a Nazi tattoo in August of last year?” Hayes asked Platner.
“I can’t say why,” Platner said, adding that he was not a recipient of Fifield’s message. “I certainly didn’t know, and the text messages she’s sending to friends may have recognized it. They didn’t tell me that.”
Fifield also alleged that Platner assaulted her at one point during their relationship, an allegation Platner said was false.
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Platner has since had the tattoo covered up after it became a campaign issue in late 2025. He wore it for nearly two decades after he said he got it during a night of drinking with his fellow Marines while stationed in Croatia in 2007.
Amid Democrats’ divisions over Platner’s candidacy, Schneider indicated he would struggle to support him at the ballot box if he were a Maine voter.
“I’ll leave it to the people of Maine to elect who they want,” he said in remarks reported by Punchbowl News. “I’m grateful I don’t have to make that choice. I wouldn’t want to have to make that choice.”
Rep. Jake Auchincloss, D-Mass., and Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., have also sharply criticized Platner’s statements related to his since-covered up tattoo.
“All I’m saying is when I was growing up, if someone had a clear Nazi tattoo on them, you probably could conclude that they’re a Nazi sympathizer,” Fetterman told CNN earlier this week. “Are you going to continue to defend that or dismiss that?”
Schneider’s New Democrat Coalition is the largest caucus among House Democrats, with more than 100 members.
Fox News Digital reached out to the Platner campaign before publication.
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