From 2011 to 2019, the state’s governor, Paul LePage, campaigned and governed on rhetoric about illegal immigrants on welfare and drug-dealing people of color. (“These are guys by the name D-Money, Smoothie, Shifty. These type of guys that come from Connecticut, New York. They come up here, they sell their heroin, then they go back home. Incidentally, half the time they impregnate a young, white girl before they leave, which is the real sad thing because then we have another issue we gotta deal with down the road.”)
