NELLIE BOWLES: My Little Totenkopf.

Graham Platner, the Maine Democrat challenging Susan Collins for her Senate seat, found himself in some trouble this week because of an old tattoo. A tramp stamp? An ex’s name on his bicep? No, it was a large totenkopf on his chest, the Nazi skull symbol worn by guards at concentration camps. Platner claims that he picked the symbol at random from the tattoo parlor’s wall with his Marine buddies (I hate when that happens!) and had no idea that there were any Nazi implications. Which is funny because according to an old acquaintance of his, there was nothing random or secret about it at all, and he would call it his totenkopf: “He said, ‘Oh, this is my totenkopf,’ ” the acquaintance told Jewish Insider. “He said it in a cutesy little way.” Platner, who described himself as “a communist” and an “antifa supersoldier” back in his old Reddit posting days, also apparently spent time in “a socialist paramilitary group.”

The best part is that the left has now painted itself into a corner with Nazi iconography, because they can no longer quite articulate why it’s bad, since killing Jews is neutral to admirable. Here’s a popular leftist commentator trying to explain why Platner’s Nazi symbol is bad:

“This isn’t just a Nazi tattoo, this is the symbol of the concentration camp guards, the guys who ran the death camps. The men who murdered socialists, communists, and liberals. They mass-murdered all black men in the French army. This is on par with a swastika.” (The commentator deleted it so I won’t name and shame. But isn’t it interesting?)

Perhaps that explains why at least one poll believes the severity of Platner’s “My Little Totenkopf” can by dismissed away as merely an “anti-Israel tattoo:”

A recent poll, screenshots of which were shared with me, includes questions inaccurately describing Graham Platner’s Nazi tattoo as an “anti-Israel tattoo” and asking if such a tattoo “is disqualifying for a candidate seeking public office.” pic.twitter.com/govp8xsmc0

— Matthew Kassel (@matthewkassel) October 24, 2025

An anti-Israel tattoo? The majority of the left in 2025 would see that phrase and think: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯