LePage accuses media of covering up welfare fraud investigation

AUGUSTA — Gov. Paul LePage said Tuesday that the State House press corps – the media reporters based in Augusta who cover the Legislature and state government – were “complicit” in covering up a federal welfare fraud investigation in Portland.

LePage, during his weekly phone-in interview on WVOM’s Ric Tyler and George Hale radio show in Bangor, said his communications staff, Peter Steele and Adrienne Bennett, had been working for “months” to get the story of the investigation out but were “ignored” by reporters in Augusta.

But reporters and editors for major news outlets that regularly cover the State House, including the Portland Press Herald, the Bangor Daily News, the Sun Journal of Lewiston, the Associated Press and Maine Public, the state’s public broadcasting network, said they were never contacted about the case by LePage’s staff.

LePage has also made no mention of the case in any of his other weekly appearances on WVOM, where he often breaks news.

Read more: http://www.pressherald.com/2016/10/18/lepage-claims-media-covered-up-welfare-fraud-investigation/