Susan Collins has been reelected to the Senate four times in a state that keeps changing underneath her. She was first elected in 1996 when Maine was competitive but reliably voted for moderate New England Republicans. She’s held the seat through Tea Party wave elections, Trump’s two campaigns, and a Democratic wave that flipped both Maine House seats.
She keeps winning. The explanations for how are more interesting than the wins themselves.
The Brand
Collins has built her political identity entirely around the concept of independence — and then demonstrated, repeatedly, that independence has limits. She has split from her party on Affordable Care Act repeal (her vote was the decisive one), voted to convict Trump after January 6, and crossed the aisle on gun legislation.
She has also voted for every Republican tax bill, confirmed several Supreme Court justices who later overturned Roe v. Wade (after telling her that they respected precedent), and caucuses with a party whose positions she periodically denounces.
Her critics call this performance. Her supporters call it the only viable politics in Maine.
The Committees
Collins chairs the Senate Appropriations Committee in the 119th Congress — the most powerful funding committee in the Senate. The committee controls all discretionary federal spending. For Maine, which receives significant federal dollars for defense (Bath Iron Works), healthcare, and rural programs, this chairmanship has direct economic consequences.
She also serves on Intelligence and HELP, giving her oversight across national security, healthcare, and education — a portfolio that maps to the broad centrist coalition she’s built in Maine.
2026
Collins will be 69 on election day 2026. She has not announced whether she’ll run for a sixth term. If she does, her record offers a campaign argument that almost no other Republican senator can make: she has demonstrably defied her party when it mattered. Whether that argument still works in an era of nationalized voting is the open question.
What They’re Watching
Whether Collins runs, and if so, whether her moderate brand holds in a political environment where party-line voting has increased even in Maine. The state elected a Democratic governor and two Democratic House members in 2024. Collins has always outperformed her party’s baseline. How much margin she still has is the question.