For months, Democratic officials had one candidate in mind to take on Republican Sen. Susan Collins in Maine, Gov. Janet Mills. There was no great mystery behind the party’s strategy: Mills is a popular and successful two-term governor. If Democrats are looking for someone with a proven track record of success, Mills, who served as a state attorney general, a state legislator and a local prosecutor, certainly fits the bill.

There is, however, one unavoidable problem: Mills will soon turn 78. (She’s five years older than Collins.) With much of the Democratic Party hungry for fresh faces and a new generation of leadership, the governor faces legitimate questions about whether she’s the right candidate at the right time.

But then Maine Democrats were introduced to an oyster farmer and combat veteran named Graham Platner, who launched his Senate candidacy in August and managed to win over a surprising number of enthusiastic supporters in a very short amount of time. Indeed, his campaign events have drawn the kind of enormous crowds usually reserved for political leaders such as Barack Obama and Bernie Sanders.

The race was shaping up to be an important showdown in one of the nation’s most closely watched Senate races, pitting an experienced politician with an impressive record against a straight-talking veteran who’s nearly half her age.

Things changed, however, when Platner’s honeymoon period came to a rather sudden end.

The first sign of trouble came to the fore last week, when Politico reported that Platner “once suggested in online posts that violence is a necessary means to achieving social change.” Around the same time, CNN reported on since-deleted comments Platner had made online in which he “once called himself a ‘communist,’ dismissed ‘all’ police as bastards, and said rural White Americans ’actually are’ racist and stupid.”

The candidate disavowed his earlier rhetoric, but other revelations soon followed. Indeed, also last week, The Bangor Daily News reported that Platner also posted messages online in which he asked why Black people “don’t tip” and suggested people concerned about being raped shouldn’t be inebriated around people they don’t feel comfortable with.

After that report reached the public, Platner’s political director resigned.

That was late last week. This week, we learned about the Senate hopeful’s choice in tattoos. Politico reported:

Democratic Maine Senate hopeful Graham Platner expressed regret over getting a tattoo that appears similar to a Nazi symbol nearly two decades ago and plans to have it removed, his latest mea culpa after a week of damning headlines over resurfaced social media posts. … Platner reiterated that he got the tattoo while out drinking with fellow Marines in Croatia, choosing the skull and crossbones off a wall at the tattoo parlor. He said the similarity to Nazi iconography never came up, including when he underwent physical exams mandated by the U.S. Army, which prohibits tattoos of identified hate symbols.

In other words, Platner’s defense is that he didn’t know he had a tattoo on his chest that resembles a Nazi symbol. What’s more, on Wednesday morning, he and his team said the image has now been covered.

“I am not a secret Nazi,” the Maine Democrat said on Monday’s episode of “Pod Save America.”

Whether or not that’s true, once a Senate candidate reaches the point at which he has to deny being a secret Nazi, his campaign isn’t quite where it should be.

Democratic officials had already started rallying behind Mills, who has said she’ll only serve one term if elected. In light of the revelations about Platner’s record, it’s likely that party support will intensify. Watch this space.