PORTAGE LAKE, Maine — Like a rock star touring on her greatest hits, Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) tore across Aroostook County, greeting adoring fans — and perhaps bidding farewell to her three-decade tenure in Washington.
Facing an arduous fight for a sixth term, Collins spent the day before the election basking in the glow of Maine’s northernmost reaches, the rural territory from which she originally hails. Her campaign has focused its closing message reminding these largely conservative voters of the irreplaceable resources Collins delivered to their Democratic-leaning state, hoping it will be enough to hold back a wave of fury at President Donald Trump and her support for much of his agenda.
In Island Falls on Monday, the fire chief provided Collins with an update on the $1.6 million grant she helped secure to rebuild the fire station. At a grocery store in Patten, where she bought a sack of locally grown potatoes, Collins took photos with well-wishing shoppers. And along the way up to the Canadian border, she stopped here for lunch at the same general store she visited on a similar bus tour six years ago, the last time it looked like Collins might not make it back to Capitol Hill.
Friends and family of owner Missy Boutot — who, as a student at Husson College, worked for Collins when she ran a center there in the mid-1990s — lined up for handshakes and selfies like a VIP meet-and-greet. One gifted Collins with a book on the history of Portage Lake.
“Thank you for all you’ve done to keep our veterans home open,” said a woman, who declined to provide her name, pulling out her phone to show Collins a photo. “And here you are with my hundred-year-old mom, when you were there recently.”
Her Democratic challenger, the former logger and Maine Senate leader Troy Jackson, also grew up in a tiny town in Aroostook County. But he has spent the final days of the midterms hundreds of miles away, in and around Portland, the population center and Democratic base in Maine’s south. Recent polls give him a slight advantage, though Collins trailed in public surveys in 2020 before winning decisively.
Jackson has sought to undercut Collins’s greatest strength — the earmarked funding she brought home as chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee — and give Democrats who crossed over to vote for Collins in previous elections permission to move on.
“There’s this real misconception,” Jackson said at a forum in Scarborough on Sunday, “that if you replace Senator Collins, we won’t be getting federal funding and stuff like that, which is totally inaccurate.”
He predicted a Democratic majority in the Senate next term, which would strip Collins of her leadership of the appropriations committee even if she won her race. Collins would not be able to provide for Maine as she has in the past, Jackson argued.
Then he slammed Collins for her procedural vote that allowed Trump’s so-called One Big Beautiful Bill Act to come to the Senate floor for consideration last year. Collins ultimately voted against the sprawling legislation, but Jackson noted that its passage means billions of dollars in cuts to health care funding, food benefits and heating assistance for Mainers in the coming years.
“The amount of money that she’s brought into Maine is a pittance compared to what we’re losing because of her votes,” Jackson said.
In an interview, Collins scoffed at the notion that Jackson could offer Maine even a fraction of what she has. She calculated $1.5 billion for nearly 700 projects across the state in the past five years.
“No senator who ranks 99th or 100th, and is not on the appropriations committee, has the seniority, the relationships, the experience, the knowledge to be able to deliver that kind of aid,” she said. “Troy would get nothing. Zero.”
Collins also castigated a reporter for asking about Jackson’s assertion that her vote was decisive in passing the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which she called “provably false.” She noted that Vice President JD Vance could have broken what would have been a tie if she had voted against it and that she wanted to continue to negotiate changes.
“I don’t mean to sound frustrated, but I am,” she said. “His numbers do not add up, at all.”
Across Aroostook County, Collins’s supporters said they were nervous about what it would mean for Maine’s future if she lost to Jackson.
“I’m not as confident that he’s going to be able to help us in the right way,” said Tom York, owner of K&T Fire Equipment, a fire truck manufacturer in Island Falls that Collins visited Monday morning.
York said his company builds its trucks across the Canadian border in nearby New Brunswick and then finishes them in Maine. Earlier this year, he worried that Trump’s 50 percent tariffs on Canadian goods could raise his prices by up to $400,000, unsustainable for his customers. But he asked Collins for help, York said, and the tariffs were never applied to his trucks.
After getting a photo with Collins outside the Ellis Family Market in Patten, Deb Susse claimed Jackson would embrace socialism — which he has not suggested — and help turn the United States into Venezuela.
“I’m concerned that the socialists are going to come in and take over our government,” the 74-year-old retired educator said. “I’m not an alarmist, but this is the first time I’m very concerned about the direction” of the country.
Jason Rich, 52, who does route sales for Frito-Lay, was unpacking inventory in the chip aisle. As Collins purchased her bag of potatoes, Rich came over to cheer her on.
He said he typically leans Democratic — he is particularly excited this year about Texas Senate nominee James Talarico — but he has voted for Collins and will again this year.
“She has a face I can trust,” he said.
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