Independent Eliot Cutler has taken the first step toward running for governor next year.

Cutler on Thursday filed paperwork with the Maine Ethics Commission to form a campaign committee that will allow him to begin raising money for a Blaine House bid.

Cutler lost to Republican Gov. Paul LePage by fewer than 10,000 votes in 2010, placing second in a race that also included Democrat Libby Mitchell. Since 2010, Cutler has remained in the public eye, maintaining a high profile through a state-level political action committee, participation in Angus King’s campaign for U.S. Senate, and by taking part in an ultimately unsuccessful national campaign to nominate a thirdparty candidate for president.

Cutler, a lawyer who lives in Cape Elizabeth, couldn’t be reached for comment Thursday, when his website was changed to feature a message saying he was evaluating a 2014 Blaine House bid.

“I am considering a candidacy for governor in 2014 and will make a decision later this year,” Cutler’s message reads. “Until then, I will be traveling around Maine, meeting with people, listening to their ideas and concerns, and talking with them about the challenges that compelled me to run in 2010 and that still confront us today.”

Cutler is the second person to form a gubernatorial campaign committee for the 2014 race. While LePage hasn’t announced whether he’s running for re-election, he’s formed a campaign committee and raised about $220,000.

“The governor is focused right now on continuing his success in lowering the unemployment rate and continuing his efforts to pay Maine’s hospital debt to fix Maine’s budget,” said Brent Littlefield, a political adviser to LePage. “There’s a process in place for candidates to get on the ballot. There’s a petition process, and that all takes place next year.”

The formation of Cutler’s committee comes two days after a national polling firm released a survey showing LePage could win re-election if the 2014 gubernatorial race becomes a three-way matchup featuring LePage, Cutler and a Democrat. Cutler would place second in three of the five scenarios the pollster, Public Policy Polling of North Carolina, tested. He would trail U.S. Reps. Mike Michaud or Chellie Pingree if either of them decided to run, according to the poll.

Public Policy Polling found Cutler would lead LePage in a head-to-head contest 49-41. But Michaud, Pingree and former Democratic Gov. John Baldacci would beat LePage by wider margins, according to the pollster. Baldacci has said he would consider a gubernatorial bid if Michaud and Pingree don’t run.

Cutler “doesn’t have a viable pathway to win the race, whereas a Democratic candidate will have a pathway to win, especially if it’s one of our top-tier candidates,” said Maine Democratic Party chairman Ben Grant.

Cutler, a Bangor native, worked for the late U.S. Sen. Edmund Muskie as counsel to a Senate Subcommittee on the Environment before joining the White House Office of Management and Budget under President Jimmy Carter. Before launching his 2010 campaign, Cutler ran the Beijing office of the Washington, D.C., law firm Akin Gump.

After his 2010 run, Cutler formed OneMaine, a statelevel political action committee that supported a handful of Democratic, Republican and independent legislative candidates during the 2012 campaign. He also signed on as a state chairman of King’s Senate campaign last year and served on the board of Americans Elect, a nonprofit organization that tried to launch a third-party presidential campaign in 2012 but was unsuccessful.