LePage takes message to cordial outlets, ignores other media

Joshua Roiland, a journalism professor at the University of Maine, said LePage's strategy is similar to Republican President-elect Donald Trump's use of Twitter: setting the day's political agendas with unfiltered, vague remarks about complex policy issues.

Some observers, including past Maine governors' press secretaries, say LePage's strategy of bringing his message directly to the people while ignoring the media could backfire by never letting his side get into stories.

Calls and emails to the governor's press office get answered occasionally, while public records requests filed by The Associated Press to LePage's office have remained unfulfilled for five months.

The governor never seemed to respect the media's role in governance — informing the public to act as citizens.

In August, after LePage created an uproar by going on an expletive-laced tirade against a Democratic legislator he believed had called him a racist, he blamed the media for fueling the controversy and announced he wouldn't be speaking to reporters anymore.