Paul LePage

Paul Richard LePage (; born October 9, 1948) is an American businessman and politician who served as the 74th governor of Maine from 2011 to 2019. A member of the Republican Party, he previously served as the mayor of Waterville, Maine, from 2004 to 2011 and as a city councilor for Waterville from 1998 to 2002.

In 2010, LePage was elected governor, winning with 37% of the vote in a race with four major candidates. In 2014, he was re-elected in a less crowded election with 48% of the vote. During his tenure as governor, LePage made extensive use of his veto power, vetoing 652 bills as of July 2018 – more than all of Maine's governors over the previous 100 years combined. LePage was known for making controversial remarks on various issues. LePage was unable to seek re-election to a third term due to term limits laws in Maine, and was succeeded by Democrat Janet Mills. After initially retiring from politics, he mounted an unsuccessful bid for governor in 2022.

In 2025, LePage announced his candidacy for Maine's 2nd congressional district in 2026.

LePage was born in Lewiston, Maine, on October 9, 1948. The eldest son of 18 children of Theresa (née Gagnon) and Gerard LePage, both of French Canadian descent, he grew up speaking French in an impoverished home with an abusive father who was a mill worker. His father drank heavily and terrorized the children, and his mother was too intimidated to stop him. His brother Moe later said of their father, "He was an evil man."

At age 11, after his father beat him and broke his nose, LePage ran away from home and lived on the streets of Lewiston. At times, he stayed in horse stables and at a strip joint. He was homeless for two years before two families took him in. LePage was the only person among his parents and siblings to graduate from the eighth grade. He graduated from Lewiston High School in 1967.

LePage performed poorly on the SAT verbal section because English was his second language. Politician Peter Snowe, who had befriended LePage, persuaded Husson College to give LePage the test in French. LePage was later accepted. He graduated from Husson in 1971 with a bachelor's degree in business administration, and earned a Master of Business Administration degree from the University of Maine in 1975.

After graduating from college, LePage began his business career working from 1972 to 1979 for a lumber company in New Brunswick, Canada, that was owned by his first wife's family. He subsequently worked for Scott Paper Company in Winslow, Maine.

In the 1980s, LePage founded the management consulting firm LePage & Kasevich Inc., which provided services to struggling businesses. In 1996, he was hired as general manager of Marden's, a Maine-based discount retail chain.

LePage entered local politics when he was elected to the Waterville City Council in 1997, serving until 2002. He was reelected to the council in 1999.

In 2003, LePage sought the office of mayor of Waterville, running against Democratic candidate Charles Kellenberger and independent Daniel Dufour. LePage won the election with 40 percent of the vote.

LePage took office as mayor on January 6, 2004, succeeding Nelson Madore. As mayor, he implemented administrative reforms, reduced municipal taxes, and increased the city's reserve fund from $1 million to $10 million. During his tenure, he had policy disagreements with Democratic Governor John Baldacci on issues including immigration enforcement and state tax policy.

On September 22, 2009, LePage announced that he would be seeking the 2010 Republican nomination for governor of Maine. He won 38% of the vote in a seven-way primary election, despite being outspent ten-to-one by his closest challenger. John Morris, LePage's campaign chief-of-staff, credited LePage's win with a campaign strategy (devised by chief strategist Brent Littlefield) that he referred to as the "three onlys" theme before the June primary election. This theme focused on particular aspects of LePage's biography that supposedly set him apart from the other candidates. These were, according to Morris, LePage "was the only candidate who had a compelling life story, ... the only candidate who had a successful experience as a chief executive officer of a government entity, ... the only candidate who was the executive of a prosperous Maine business."

In the general election, LePage was backed by local Tea Party activists and faced Democratic state senator Libby Mitchell, and three independents – Eliot Cutler, Shawn Moody, and Kevin Scott. During the campaign, he told an audience that when he became governor, they could expect to see newspaper headlines stating, "LePage Tells Obama to Go to Hell". He was subsequently criticized by Libby Mitchell's campaign as being disrespectful towards the office of the president.

With 94% of precincts reporting on the day after the election, the Bangor Daily News declared LePage the winner, carrying 38.1% of the votes. Independent Cutler was in second place with 36.7% of the votes (fewer than 7,500 votes behind LePage), while Democrat Mitchell was a distant third with 19%. Moody and Scott had 5% and 1%, respectively. LePage was the first popularly elected, Franco-American governor of Maine and the first Republican since John R. McKernan Jr.'s re-election in 1990. In his victory speech, LePage promised he would shrink government, lower taxes, decrease business regulation, and put "Maine people ahead of politics".

On May 7, 2013, LePage stated that it was likely that he would seek re-election in 2014. He had already filed paperwork to form a campaign committee in August 2011 to be able to hold fundraisers to raise campaign funds. On June 21, 2013, when asked if he was concerned about hurting his re-election campaign, he replied, "Who said I'm running?", and, that "everything was on the table"—including entering the race for Maine's Second Congressional District; retiring; or "going back to Marden's to stock shelves". He later backed off the reference to entering a congressional run, but stated that he would have a family meeting to discuss the possibility of him not seeking re-election, citing the passage of a 2013–2014 budget by the legislature—in override of his veto of it—as the type of devastating mistake that Maine could not recover from. At a fundraiser with former Florida governor Jeb Bush on July 2, he told supporters that he was indeed running for re-election.

At 12:04 AM on November 5, the Bangor Daily News declared that Paul LePage had won re-election to a second term, defeating Democratic Congressman Mike Michaud and independent candidate Eliot Cutler. He received 48.2% of the vote.

LePage returned to Maine in June 2019 to take a job as a bartender at McSeagulls Restaurant in Boothbay, where his wife had worked as a server during his gubernatorial tenure. The restaurant owner stated that hiring LePage was not a publicity stunt, citing the difficulty of hiring new workers.

LePage is the Republican nominee for Maine's 2nd congressional district in the U.S. House of Representatives in 2026.

In 2006, LePage was voted the Mid-Maine Chamber of Commerce's businessman of the year.

In 2007, he was named "Maine Business Champion" by the National Federation of Independent Business.

LePage received an honorary doctorate from Thomas College in Waterville, at their graduation ceremonies on May 12, 2012, where he was the keynote speaker.

On September 10, 2013, LePage received an award from the Maine Suicide Prevention Program to recognize his efforts to prevent and raise awareness about suicide.

On May 13, 2019, LePage was given an honorary degree by the University of Maine System Board of Trustees to recognize his support of education in Maine, and specifically the university system.

In 1971, LePage married Sharon Crabbe, whose family owned a lumber business in New Brunswick, where LePage worked as treasurer and general manager. They resided in Perth-Andover, New Brunswick, and their two daughters were born in 1975 and 1976. LePage and Crabbe divorced in 1980.

LePage has two children with his second wife, Ann DeRosby, whom he married in 1984. Since 2002, his household has also included a young man from Jamaica, whom he calls an adopted son.