Novelist Stephen King called Maine Gov. Paul LePage (R) a “bigot, homophobe and a racist” on Saturday, after a week in which the governor made several inflammatory remarks.
King, who is a longtime Maine resident, sent the tweet after the governor used a homophobic slur against a Democratic lawmaker because he believed the man had called him a racist.
Earlier in the week, LePage said he keeps a binder filled with mugshots of everyone who had been arrested for dealing drugs in the state, and that more than 90 percent of the people in it were black or Hispanic. Ninety-five percent of Maine residents are white, according to U.S. Census data.
On Friday, the governor denied that police were engaging in racial profiling in arrests for drug dealing, and called people of color and Hispanics “the enemy.”
Last year, LePage accused King of leaving the state to avoid taxes ― a claim that wasn’t true. King said that LePage should “man up and apologize” to him, but the governor refused.