Politics
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Scott Reed, the longtime Republican strategist at the center of ProPublica’s report alleging U.S. Sen. Susan Collins and other lawmakers may have been involved in a pay-to-play scheme, remains a major force in the five-term incumbent’s inner circle.
The former Republican National Committee official and Bob Dole’s 1996 campaign manager, Reed led 1820 PAC, which took an illegal $150,000 donation in 2019 from an LLC set up by Martin Kao, then CEO of the Hawaii defense contractor Navatek. The donation made headlines during Collins’ 2020 race and is at the center of this week’s report.
Reed now helms Pine Tree Results PAC, which has booked more than $28 million in ads in Collins’ reelection bid against Democrat Troy Jackson, according to AdImpact data. Her campaign and the Reed-led group raise money together through a joint committee. Reed’s lobbying firm, Chesapeake Enterprises, paid the senator’s husband, Tom Daffron, as a consultant last year.
Collins has defended Reed’s character while denying a bribery scheme, telling reporters in Washington on Wednesday that the operative is “a person of great integrity,” according to Punchbowl News. Reporters questioned a top aide on Daffron’s work with Reed in Portland on Wednesday.
“He’s an adult professional that’s worked off and on with Scott Reed for 30-something years, maybe 40-something years,” Steve Abbott, Collins’ campaign manager and longtime chief of staff, said of Daffron. “They’re friends, and they’re still working together.”
ProPublica reported the FBI was still digging into Navatek’s donations, along with potential bribery involving Collins and other lawmakers, by late 2024 before the second Trump administration dismantled the agency’s anti-corruption teams.
Collins has described ProPublica’s investigation as a smear campaign coming close to Election Day. The senator’s team on Wednesday also highlighted her February 2025 letter to then-Attorney General Pam Bondi urging against a crackdown on FBI agents.
Pine Tree Results PAC, the new Reed-led group, relies on many of the same billionaires who funded the 1820 PAC of the 2020 cycle, led by Blackstone CEO Stephen Schwarzman, who has given the new group $3 million. In all, 21 donors have given to both super PACs.
The new group also leans heavily on organizations whose own funders aren’t disclosed, including $3 million from the group Stronger America, which is running its own pro-Collins ads, and $1.25 million from the Lexington Fund, part of a network linked to conservative legal activist Leonard Leo.
Reed was a central figure in separate complaints from Campaign Legal Center and Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington a decade ago. In those complaints, a Reed-linked group was accused of flouting campaign finance laws. His lobbying firm, Chesapeake Enterprises, faced allegations of failing to file required lobbying reports.
Brendan Fischer, who heads Campaign Legal Center’s strategic investigations team, said Reed had been “involved in super PACs and dark money groups pushing the legal envelope.” He also said Kao’s brazenness, including telling Reed in an email that he was using an LLC to make a six-figure donation, offered a rare “peek behind the curtain.”
“Many prospective government contractors are going to be more careful and sophisticated in their influence peddling,” Fischer said. “This entire episode speaks to the way money talks in Washington.”
Reed is also a longtime friend of Daffron, a former lobbyist and strategist for both Collins and her mentor, former Sen. William Cohen. He left his role as an executive at Reed’s firm, Chesapeake Enterprises, more than 20 years ago, but he received at least $1,000 in consulting fees from Reed’s firm last year, according to Collins’ required Senate income disclosures.
The Maine Democratic Party has seized on Daffron’s ties to Reed. Collins’ campaign did not answer questions about the nature of their work together. Neither Pine Tree Results PAC nor Reed responded to requests for comment.
Super PACs can take unlimited donations. Campaigns and super PACs are not allowed to coordinate on ads or share nonpublic campaign strategy. But a 2024 advisory opinion from the Federal Election Commission allows them to raise money together through a joint fundraising committee, as long as the candidate’s side solicits only donations within federal limits.
Pine Tree Results PAC has received $394,000 since March 2025 from a joint fundraising committee that raises money in Collins’ name and passes a share of the net proceeds to the super PAC, according to FEC filings. Asked if the senator has sought any changes to her fundraising operations in the wake of Kao’s illegal donation, her team emphasized that the campaign and PACs are separate entities.
Collins on Wednesday told The Wall Street Journal that the entire story was “a smear job” timed to impact the election. She called it “disgraceful” that ProPublica took “the words of a twice-convicted felon” in Kao. The outlet responded to that criticism on social media by emphasizing the emails and independent corroboration included in the story.
The FEC’s general counsel in 2024 recommended a finding that Reed’s PAC violated regulations by failing to refund the $150,000 donation from an LLC established by Kao “once it discovered the illegality of the contribution,” according to a report in the case file. But the FEC, which found Kao’s donation violated campaign finance laws, took no action.
Ellen Weintraub, a former Democratic FEC chair who sat on the commission as it reviewed the Campaign Legal Center’s complaint on Kao’s donation, said in an interview that she did not see any evidence of wrongdoing by Collins or her campaign.
But she said the case highlights that “sometimes it’s what’s legal that’s appalling in terms of the way money in politics and campaign contributions greases the wheels.”
“There is this pay-to-play atmosphere in Washington that is not improving,” she said.