Maine’s Senate race comes down to three big questions | Opinion

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Sam Patten has worked for Maine’s last three Republican senators, including Susan Collins’ first electoral campaigns, is a former managing editor of The Maine Wire and is the author of “Dangerous Company: The Misadventures of a Foreign Agent.”

My parents are second cousins and, despite my various defects, I’m nonetheless blessed to have 10 fingers and 10 toes. Given the tribalism of our little corner of America, light inbreeding is not altogether uncommon.

That’s why I braced slightly when I heard Sen. Susan Collins deliver a sideways slight at her opponent Troy Jackson’s being a second cousin of his partner and mother of his children a couple months back. The Senate Leadership Fund’s radio ad that hit Maine airwaves last week, asserting that Jackson “screws his own family and will screw yours too” crossed a line — even for those whose parents aren’t related.

One thing I have learned about advertising is that if your product has the effect of making your base chortle with glee, it’s a bad ad and will probably backfire.

“We’re from Washington and we’re here to help,” the old joke goes.

While it is true that Collins neither authored nor approved the ad and she did call for it to be taken down on Wednesday (following public backlash), the episode raises another uncomfortable question about her: If Maine’s senior senator is so powerful, why is there such a mounting list of things she does not control?

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The world laughed a couple weeks ago when another helpful pro-Collins PAC placed supportive TV ads in Portland … Oregon. How refreshing it would be if folks from Washington came around here less.

A new low in negative ads was also seen in Ohio this past week, where the campaign of Republican Vivek Ramaswamy aired an ad featuring the estranged mother of his Democratic opponent Amy Acton calling her daughter a liar because she accused her stepfather of rape. Yuck. Vice President JD Vance then urged everyone to stop whining about the ad. That doesn’t diminish its ugliness. Ramaswamy will earn his defeat.

These are desperate times.

More than two weeks into early voting, many Mainers have already cast their ballot one way or the other in the tight race for the U.S. Senate. In a state where split-ticket voting is a proud tradition, the outcome will remain tough to predict right down to the wire.

Having studied her closely since the beginning of her political career in 1994, I’d wager Collins’ likelihood of being elected to a sixth term will come down to how undecided voters answer three questions.

First, and perhaps most important from the national perspective, is she willing to stand up to President Donald J. Trump, the de facto leader of the Republican Party, when it really matters? Second, for how much does her seniority count? And third, do Mainers believe — as her Democratic opponent Troy Jackson has alleged — that Collins thinks she is better than us?

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This past week, Trump’s approval rating reached its lowest point ever; as few as 31% of Americans told pollsters he was doing a good job as president. That’s really the bottom of his base, and these are tough days for even his core supporters to be amped up about the president. Dwindling loyalists now resemble family members of a problem drinker who made a mess of the living room last night, but empathize because he’s going through a hard time right now and we just need to remember his good qualities and be patient.

Again, we are reminded of the many things Sen. Susan Collins does not control.

Collins did vote to convict Trump in 2021 following his second impeachment, even though it was clear the effort would fall 10 votes short of being meaningful. What promise has she offered to do more in Trump’s remaining two years in office? After all, much of Jackson’s support comes from those who want to send Trump a message.

The strongest argument for returning Collins to Washington comes down to her seniority, and her occupying the chair of the Appropriations Committee. Broadly speaking, though, seniority is a double-edged sword. Were that the key metric by which we voted, we’d never elect new people. Also, one might reasonably question what that power has bought Maine.

When Alaska’s Ted Stevens sat in the same chair, he used it to literally build the state up from its wild surroundings. West Virginia’s Robert Byrd brought massive federal projects home, including federal agencies themselves. And Alabama’s Richard Shelby relocated part of NASA to Huntsville, dramatically improving his state’s economy. Have we in Maine seen a comparable degree of pork?

Finally, there is the question of humility. Time spent in Washington tends to chip its reserves away. This is such a subjective standard that each individual voter will have to answer whether Collins cares about them, and people like them, in the quiet seclusion of the polling booth.

This election isn’t about Troy Jackson; he’s an accidental candidate. It’s about Susan Collins and how, after 32 years, one answers three simple questions.

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Tagged: columns, election 2026, senate 2026