FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
May 7, 2026
CONTACT: press@bobbyformaine.com
LEEDS, ME: Yesterday, the Bangor Daily News published a series of articles attempting to rewrite the record of Republican gubernatorial frontrunner Bobby Charles’ federal service in the wake of the September 11 attacks and during his tenure as Assistant Secretary of State for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement. The Charles campaign is releasing on the record statements from three of the men who actually served alongside Bobby, a retired Navy Commander, a former U.S. Ambassador and Acting Inspector General of the State Department, and a retired Air Force Colonel who ran the largest police academy in the world under Bobby’s direction.
Their accounts directly contradict the BDN’s reporting.
“The BDN can pull every audit they want from a 20 year war and stitch it together to attack a Republican frontrunner one month before a primary. What they cannot do is find one person who actually worked with me who will say I was anything other than a fierce steward of taxpayer dollars,” said Bobby Charles. “I am proud of my service. I am proud of what we built. And I am not going to stand down because the legacy media in Maine has decided I am the threat they need to take out.”
THE CLAIM: The BDN reports that the Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs spent billions “without accountability” during Bobby’s tenure.
THE RECORD, FROM THE MAN WHO LATER SERVED AS ACTING INSPECTOR GENERAL OF THE STATE DEPARTMENT:
“Bobby did not go to Washington to maintain the status quo; he went there to dismantle the ‘business as usual’ bureaucracy,” said Ambassador (Ret.) William Todd, former U.S. Ambassador to Brunei and Cambodia, former Acting Inspector General of the U.S. Department of State, and former Deputy Under Secretary for Management at State. “Bobby didn’t just talk about oversight; he built an internal management evaluation and analysis function that reviewed every program and every dollar spent within the bureau. Every contractor and every internal leader was held to a standard of absolute accountability. Many of these rigorous systems remain in place at the INL today.”
THE CLAIM: The BDN reports that police training under Bobby’s bureau was a “total disaster.”
THE RECORD, FROM THE COLONEL WHO ACTUALLY RAN THE TRAINING:
“Not only did the effort not fail, it was a resounding success,” said Colonel John Mosbey, PhD, USAF (Ret.), who served as the senior U.S. Department of State Police Advisor in Iraq and later as Director of the Jordan International Police Training Center, the largest police academy in the world during his tenure. “The constant professional oversight, coordination, diligence, and support of the U.S. State Department, under the leadership of Assistant Secretary Robert (Bobby) Charles, was critical to the successful accomplishment of what may have been the riskiest police training mission the United States has ever undertaken. His professional ability, integrity, and dedication were legendary in the Law Enforcement circles I moved in.”
THE CLAIM: The BDN attempts to undermine Bobby’s character and the foundation of his federal service.
THE RECORD, FROM HIS FORMER COMMANDER IN NAVAL INTELLIGENCE:
“Bobby selflessly, and courageously, volunteered to return full time in uniform immediately following the September 11, 2001, terrorist attack on the Pentagon,” said retired U.S. Navy Commander David Radi, Bobby’s former commanding officer. “Our unit, the forward arm of Naval Intelligence inside the Pentagon, lost seven colleagues in the attack out of a team only measuring a few dozen. It was far from clear that the attacks were over, yet Bobby came forward and said ‘put me in.’ He wouldn’t flee from danger. He led by example and from the front. He was courageous and a patriot. Our Navy and the highest levels of our federal government placed our trust in Bobby and he delivered.”
WHY NOW. WHY HIM.
Bobby Charles has led every public poll in this race. He won the Maine GOP Convention Straw Poll. He has been outspent more than ten to one and hit with AI generated smear ads from a PAC funded by Democratic donors. The establishment knows he is the only Republican who can actually defeat the Democrat in November and end eight years of Janet Mills’ failures, so they attack. He is the strongest threat they have faced in a generation.
Bobby Charles has faced cheats, liars and thugs throughout his career serving our Country. He fought back after September 11 and ran toward the Pentagon to rebuild. He fought back against cartels in Colombia. He fought back against contractors who tried to cheat the American taxpayer, and now he is going to fight back for Mainers.
Bobby Charles is a former federal investigator, naval intelligence officer, and former U.S. Assistant Secretary of State. He is the Republican frontrunner for Governor, campaigning on a platform of cutting crime, eliminating the state income tax over four years, and ending the corruption in Augusta.
