AUGUSTA, Maine — A tenuous bipartisan alliance between Maine House Speaker Mark Eves and Senate President Mike Thibodeau disintegrated on Friday when Thibodeau effectively nixed the possibility of a special legislative session to address Gov. Paul LePage’s latest controversy.

Thibodeau, a Republican from Winterport, effectively slammed the door on a special session Friday during a press conference where he accused Democrats of making this a “campaign issue” and said he won’t preside over what he called a “circus” special session.

Eves, a term-limited Democrat from North Berwick, hoped to succeed in putting lawmakers on the record about LePage’s comments last week about minority drug dealers and a subsequent obscene voicemail to a lawmaker ahead of the November election, but it was immediately contested by House Minority Leader Ken Fredette, R-Newport.

The speaker’s email to House members went out on Friday morning, asking, “Do you consent to coming in for a special session of the Legislature to take action regarding the Governor’s conduct?”

“Maine cannot afford to spend the next two years lurching from crisis to crisis caused by Governor LePage’s erratic behavior instead of working on issues facing Maine people,” Eves said in a statement.

This poll was the subject of confusion after a meeting between legislative leaderson Thursday, which led to a three-way split between Democrats and the two top Republicans, Thibodeau and Fredette.

Democrats were unanimous in wanting to return to consider LePage’s removal from office. Thibodeau was willing to consider returning to censure LePage and says some in his caucus want to, as well. Fredette and his caucus don’t want to return for any reason and said they had the votes to block it.

The Maine Constitution provides a high hurdle ahead of a special session, saying all members must be polled and a majority of legislators in each political party must agree.

However, it says the “call” for a poll must come from both the speaker and Senate president. Thibodeau ruled that out on Friday after Fredette said in a Friday letter to Eves that he wouldn’t respond to the poll.

In a step that may have cinched Thibodeau’s opposition, Eves got ahead of the Senate president with the call for a poll on Friday, saying in a news release, “We encourage the Senate to poll each Senator with the same question.” Thibodeau spokesman Jim Cyr didn’t know about the poll question before it was released on Friday.

Eves also angered Thibodeau on Thursday by telling reporters that the Senate president — who is first in the gubernatorial line of succession — would make a better governor than LePage. Thibodeau said that was a moot point because there’s no will among Republicans to consider removing LePage from office, and “there will be no Gov. Thibodeau.”

For now, there’s only LePage, who said he was considering resigning on Tuesday. On Wednesday, he ruled it out and said he wouldn’t talk to the press again.

Leaving the State House on Friday before Thibodeau addressed media, he declined comment on special session chatter, saying, “My good man, these people will be happy to answer your question,” and pointing to his press offices. His representatives declined comment.