Politics
Our political journalists are based in the Maine State House and have deep source networks across the partisan spectrum in communities all over the state. Their coverage aims to cut through major debates and probe how officials make decisions. Read more Politics coverage here.
LEWISTON, Maine — Jennifer Jayne Bell drove here last week to get her first up-close look at Troy Jackson, the Democrat trying to unseat Sen. Susan Collins.
She left more certain about her feelings toward Collins than about Jackson.
“I’m probably going to support him no matter what, because I would not vote for Susan Collins,” Bell, who moved to Brunswick a few months ago, said before Jackson’s town hall.
But Bell said Jackson’s lack of polish worries her a bit, and that politics has increasingly become about appearances rather than values.
“I’m open to him,” she said. “For me it’s more about his values and as long as he’s speaking kindly, respectfully and with inclusion.”
Bell’s ambivalence about the candidate, paired with her certainty about the incumbent, sums up one of the questions hanging over Jackson’s quickly conceived campaign against Collins: Is this a race that Democrats are joining or one they’re just trying to end?
Jackson’s supporters and critics alike say he lacks the rare magnetism of Graham Platner, whose populist campaign he inherited, along with the polish and name recognition of most candidates in a high-profile battleground Senate race. The former Allagash logger and Maine Senate president has tapped into the left’s frustration with Collins and President Donald Trump over affordability, abortion rights and immigration enforcement.
But even polls showing Jackson leading the five-term senator suggest many Mainers view the race as a referendum on Collins more than a rally behind his candidacy. Roughly 6 in 10 of Jackson’s supporters said their vote is primarily against Collins, according to a recent Fox News poll. That’s up from 48% who said the same when Platner was still in the race.
“It’s a bit of both,” Shanna Cox, a former Lewiston-area chamber of commerce CEO who is now running as a Democrat for the city’s Maine Senate seat, said. “He’s got a strong backing … you’ve seen organized folks come out and really be in support of Troy. And there’s a whole bunch of folks who are just against Collins. And quite frankly, as long as you’re energized, I don’t care what gets you to the booth.”
Collins has greater name recognition than Jackson, an issue he also faced in his third-place gubernatorial primary run, while her campaign and allied groups are outspending Democrats on advertising by a wide margin. Several polls have shown Jackson ahead. Democrats hope to capitalize on sagging approval for both Collins and Trump.
Skepticism remains after Collins defied polls in 2020. Last week, Sabato’s Crystal Ball, which lists the race as a toss-up, said its “best guess” remains a Collins victory, even as it predicted Republican losses in Alaska, Michigan and Ohio, all of which are more conservative than Maine.
Platner shared Jackson’s labor base and was a uniquely good public speaker. But one of the major public debates about his campaign was whether he was genuine enough to claim the working-class mantle as the grandson of a prominent architect. His father is a retired lawyer who helped him by his Sullivan home after he left the military.
Jackson, whose mother had him at age 16 in a remote part of northern Maine, is not being questioned in the same way. But he speaks haltingly and only agreed to debates with Collins last week following a protracted back-and-forth debate between the campaigns. His ardent supporters say that folksy style is an asset against an entrenched incumbent, not a liability.
“When you see Troy, he’s a Mainer, he’s not trying to be anyone he’s not,” said Colin Schlobohm, a Greene student who will turn 18 before Election Day and the son of Maine AFL-CIO head Matt Schlobohm. “Maybe that comes off as not senatorial. But … he’s authentic. He’s going to do what he says, back working Mainers and stick to his roots.”
His friend, Ricky Whitmore, 16, put the anti-Collins case more bluntly: “You’d have to be a pretty bad Democrat for me to not want you against Collins,” he said.
“But I also think Troy is an amazing example of what we want. He’s so relatable, he’s not an establishment Democrat, and I think we really need someone like that in office,” he added.
Collins and Republican groups, meanwhile, have focused on the senator’s record and history of bringing federal dollars to Maine. They’ve also targeted Jackson’s ties to Platner and his political evolution from Republican to independent to Democrat, casting him as an Augusta insider.
“He spent more than two decades in Augusta, including six years as president of the Maine Senate, and now he’s running around the state telling Mainers that the status quo isn’t working,” Blake Kernen, a Collins campaign spokesperson, said.
Kristen Cianci, a spokesperson for the Republican National Committee, said Jackson was trying to ride the coattails of the “disgraced” Platner, calling Jackson “low-charisma” and saddled with his predecessor’s baggage.
Cox pushed back on the idea that Jackson is starting from scratch, noting that Platner supporters, labor organizers and rank-and-file Democrats quickly backed him as the nominee. With less than two months until Nov. 3, she said, it’s “still early” for Jackson to introduce himself to more voters.
“Come November,” she said, “there won’t be anybody who doesn’t know his name.”