Susan Collins’ long-running balancing act in Trump-era politics came to an abrupt end in Maine on Tuesday. The five-term Republican senator and Appropriations Committee chair lost her bid for a sixth term to Democrat Troy Jackson, and as she tells the New York Times, she blames a wave of voter anger aimed squarely at President Trump, not her. Collins says even longtime supporters told her they were backing away “to send a message to Trump,” despite her occasional breaks with the former president—including a vote to convict him in his second impeachment trial, a fact she says “everybody ignores.” “What bigger break could there be? It is never enough. I want results and they want angry rhetoric.”
The Times details how a tsunami of Trump policies and perceptions finally caught up with a moderate senator once seen as nearly unbeatable: tariffs on Canada, an immigration crackdown that turned deadly in Maine, high heating-oil prices, and lingering resentment over her vote to confirm Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court before he joined the majority that overturned Roe v. Wade. In rejecting her, Maine gave up a powerful appropriations chair for a freshman senator with far less clout—an upset that the Guardian notes Jackson pulled off in “just 101 days,” after the withdrawal of Democratic nominee Graham Platner. Yet even on Election Night, Collins and her supporters believed she’d defy the odds one more time, as she made “a long, beaming pass” just before 10pm through her watch party, per the Atlantic in a piece headlined “Susan Collins Didn’t Have a Chance.” Just after midnight, she’d call Jackson to concede. “She would not return to the party,” says the Atlantic.