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Graham Platner and his allies have come out in full force against the claims made against him by Lyndsey Fifield, a former girlfriend of Platner’s who has worked for Republican groups.

But Fifield said Friday morning that if anything, the New York Times, which on Thursday published her account of dating Platner, sanitized her story. She accused the reporters of a “set up” and claiming they “twisted this into a gift” to the Maine Democrat’s campaign.

The story from the Times described how Fifield, who dated Platner for roughly two years starting in 2013, shared that Platner “regularly grabbed her by the shoulders — sometimes hard enough to leave marks.” It said she referred to him in a 2016 diary entry as “the most toxic literally abusive man on earth who destroyed my life.” The piece also quoted Fifield alleging that Platner had told her when they were dating about his since-covered tattoo that resembles a Nazi symbol — undercutting his long-standing claim that he didn’t understand the symbol’s significance until he entered the Senate race.

Platner and his campaign denied the allegations of physical altercations. Platner told MS NOW’s Chris Hayes during an interview Thursday night that while he had acknowledged “not being a good boyfriend” and using alcohol to self-medicate in the past, “anything alleging physicality, anything alleging that I knew what my tattoo was; these are the statements of someone who is politically motivated.”

Fifield, 40, who lives in Virginia, is listed as a “visiting fellow” on the website of the conservative group Independent Women. Her resume includes previously working for the conservative Heritage Foundation and briefly on former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley’s 2024 presidential campaign.

“Let’s be very clear: This is a lifelong GOP operative who’s dedicated her career to electing Republicans,” the Platner campaign said in a statement Thursday.

In October, CNN’s KFile ran a story citing an anonymous source who alleged Platner knew years ago that the skull and crossbones he had tattooed on his body in 2007 was a Nazi symbol. Fifield made a similar claim to the Times in Thursday’s story. CNN has confirmed that Fifield was also the source for its story from the fall.

The most salacious material in the New York Times piece is primarily — but not entirely — sourced from Fifield’s claims. Two other women — one who is described in the story as a 41-year-old Maine Democrat, and one who remained anonymous and had a long-distance, “on and off” relationship with Platner for years and as recently as 2016 — were mentioned less prominently in the Times article. Those women focused mostly on what they described as his problematic drinking and his controversial past Reddit posts.

FEELING SET UP

Fifield, who met Platner when the two were living in Washington, D.C., used a series of posts on X Friday morning to describe her dissatisfaction with the Times reporting. She wrote about how the Times had connected her to two other women during the reporting process. She said she “insisted to each of them that I trusted the NYT journalists and that we were doing the right thing despite their (sadly very accurate) sense that something was wrong.”

“It dawned on me that this really was a set up all along,” Fifield wrote. “The journalists I trusted who convinced me to share a story I never wanted to tell methodically delayed and twisted this into a gift to the Platner campaign. Violating the trust of his victims. Shattering the trust I placed in them with the most vulnerable story of my life.”

Fifield, who did not immediately respond to the Press Herald’s request for comment Friday, said she resisted “my conservative bias” to “fully trust the Times journalists” and that she “met every bench mark they set, eager to provide more sources or evidence as needed.”

“Where were the screenshots they’d said they would use? Or the mention that I’d supported local Democrats and that most of my family (and husband) are liberal?” wrote Fifield, who said she had no connection to the campaign of Platner’s likely opponent in November, U.S. Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine — though she acknowledged Independent Women has been supportive of Collins. (The group, for example, applauded her and other senators in 2018 for voting to confirm Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh following his highly contentious confirmation process.)

Fifield wrote that Times editors said the additional material she provided “was too much.” She said she asked the Times reporters after the story published Thursday, “Where are the stories from the other women? Where are their accusations of sexual assault? Why am I the focus?” (The Times and Press Herald did not independently corroborate Fifield’s account of physical altercations, and no one in the story or in other stories has made sexual assault claims against Platner.)

“The Times also failed to include any mention that I DID confide in multiple friends through the years that Graham had been abusive — long before he was running for office. Those friends confirm they told the Times so,” Fifield wrote.

The story from Times reporters Lisa Lerer and Katie Glueck said the publication “reviewed some of Ms. Fifield’s diary entries from after the relationship had ended, and spoke with two of her friends who confirmed that the pair had an emotionally volatile relationship but could not corroborate the physical altercations or the most controversial comments she described.”

TIMES STANDS BY STORY

Nicole Taylor, a New York Times spokesperson, said in a statement Friday that their story accurately reflects the accounts of the women they spoke to who were in romantic relationships with Platner.

“We stand by our reporting of the accounts from Ms. Fifield and the other women, who provided a revealing look at the behavior of a major candidate for the U.S. Senate,” Taylor said.

Platner, who has had plenty of momentum in polling and fundraising amid the various controversies his campaign has faced, remains the favorite in Tuesday’s primary election that decides which Democrat will seek to unseat Collins in November.

Platner was set to attend a Friday evening rally in Bar Harbor featuring U.S. Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif., and Maine Democrats who are on the ballot in the gubernatorial and 2nd District races.