U.S. Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, is seeking her sixth term in the United States Senate.
Every six years, Maine posts a job opening for a United States senator. I’m applying to keep the job, and you are the hiring committee. On Tuesday, you make the hire.
A good committee looks for sound judgment, integrity and a record of working across party lines. It wants a leader who can negotiate agreements that last and who knows when to give a little and when to hold firm.
Then it checks references. Here are mine.
Denise, a retired Aroostook County schoolteacher who now collects the full Social Security she earned because of a law I worked to pass. Gerry, a Knox County lobsterman, and the nearly 5,000 others still hauling traps because I wrote the law that shielded them from federal rules that threatened the whole industry. Jean, who owns a hotel in York County that survived the pandemic thanks to the Paycheck Protection Program I wrote, which saved more than 250,000 jobs.
Mark in Androscoggin County, whose son has Type 1 diabetes and counts on the research I fight to fund to stay healthy. The emergency room teams in Bridgton, Rumford and Millinocket, where funding I secured is building and expanding the ERs families depend on. And ask Maine’s firefighters and police officers both of whose unions have endorsed me.
As chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, I have brought home nearly $1.5 billion for 672 projects in all 16 counties over the past five years, including $10 million to modernize Maine Veterans’ Homes and improve care for those who served. I fought for Bath-built ships and for jobs at Portsmouth Naval Shipyard in Kittery and Pratt & Whitney in North Berwick.
I am working to lower prescription drug costs for our seniors and to build more housing so your kids can build their lives here. I won’t stop.
I have always worked across the aisle. In 2009, I was one of three Republicans who joined President Obama to pass the recovery package that helped end the Great Recession. I led the effort to repeal Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell and to pass the Respect for Marriage Act. I voted to save the Affordable Care Act. Last year, I opposed this president’s signature budget bill over its Medicaid cuts and still secured $190 million this year alone to support Maine’s rural hospitals.
I don’t work for any president. I work for you. When this administration cut off funding for Maine Sea Grant, which serves our coastal towns, I called the commerce secretary and got it restored. When tariffs threatened Maine businesses that depend on Canadian trade, I pressed the White House and secured exemptions.
My opponent, Troy Jackson, says he is going to Washington to fight. I believe America is crying out for compromise and less chaos.
In Augusta, Jackson pushed costly programs, from solar subsidies that raised electric bills to spending that leaves the next governor a projected $1.3 billion budget gap. Governors of both parties vetoed more than 100 of his bills.
Fellow Democrats have questioned his temper. He says he has no regrets for telling me to “shut up” in our final debate. Shouting may win “likes” on social media, but it doesn’t pass bills in a closely divided Senate. That takes sound judgment, strong relationships and a willingness to find common ground with people you disagree with.
Outside groups have spent millions to mislead you about my record and my integrity. But you know me. You’ve seen me visiting small businesses, schools and in the grocery store. You trust me to work hard and do what is right, something I learned growing up in the County. I have never missed a roll call vote, more than 10,000 in a row.
Check my references. Compare our records. I offer results and the independent leadership to keep them coming. Maine needs a senator who puts Maine first and knows how to get things done.
On Tuesday, you make the hire and I ask for your vote.
Read the op-ed: Portland Press Herald