Maine, Senator Sue Collins, Pragmatism, and the Election Tossup Chickens

It’s time to stop nonsense about six alleged tossup states, But let’s also discuss Sue Collins.

Iowa and Kansas are genuine tossup state. It is absurd to call Ohio or Alaska tossup states.

Texas and Maine are closer to tossups but the betting markets and polls suggest there is a favorite.

Of course, favorites don’t always win but hiding behind the tossup label pretty much makes you useless except as a a lagging indicator. 65 percent is not a tossup.

Sabato’s Cloudy Ball

Please consider Democrats Appear to Hold Narrow Senate Edge with Week to Go; Rating Changes for Senate, House, and Governors by Sabato’s Center for Politics posted October 27, 2026.

— With a week until Election Day, Democrats seem to have a slight advantage in the battle for the Senate, with Maine and Texas emerging as the likeliest majority-making contests.

— In the Carolinas, we are making former Gov. Roy Cooper (D-NC) more of a favorite to win his state’s open-seat Senate race while making Sen. Darline Graham (R-SC) less of one. Sen. Ashley Moody (R-FL) also moves on to the board as Likely Republican, but she is still clearly favored.

Serious Wimpiness

North Carolina was decided months ago. Cooper is a 95 percent favorite and Sabato is finally coming around but not even fully.

Sabato just now changed North Carolina from lean to likely. Anyone with an ounce of sense had North Carolina as solid Democrat months ago.

Let’s read on.

How the Senate stands one week out—and more rating changes
Throughout the 2024 election, there was an incessant focus on seven key swing states that would determine the presidency. That group, comprising Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin in the Industrial North, Georgia and North Carolina in the southeast, and Arizona and Nevada out west, all ended up breaking for Donald Trump.

With just a week to go until the 2026 midterm, the highly competitive race for the Senate again features seven key states, although only one of them—Michigan—is on both the 2024 and 2026 lists. That also is the only one of the seven that Democrats are defending; the others are Republican defensive assignments in Maine, otherwise a blue state, as well as red states Alaska, Iowa, Kansas, Ohio, and Texas. Just as in 2024, the polling in all seven of these races is fairly tight, with the largest lead being a little under 4 points in the Silver Bulletin’s averages (that is Democrat Mary Peltola’s current edge in Alaska, which is not polled very much compared to some others). But Democrats do technically lead in all of these state averages as of this writing, even if the leads are often quite marginal.

These are not the only competitive seats, but they are the ones where we wouldn’t at this point consider a win by one side or the other as very surprising. Still—seven is a lot of states, and that doesn’t even include some other states that are competitive but where the underdog winning would be a bigger surprise, like Minnesota, Nebraska, and South Carolina. Assuming no other upsets, the side that wins a majority of these seven states would win the Senate: four of seven would get Democrats to 51 seats or Republicans to 50, a quasi-majority with the vice presidential tiebreaker.

We have had Alaska and Michigan at least leaning to Democrats for the past several weeks, and we still feel OK about those ratings; both the aforementioned Peltola and former Wayne County Health official Abdul El-Sayed (D) have usually posted narrow but consistent leads in polls. In electorally marginal Michigan, the pro-Democratic environment is papering over some of El-Sayed’s weaknesses, and he still appears to be lagging Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson (D) in the gubernatorial race: While it represents something of an extreme example, a fresh YouGov/Michigan State University poll showed the former running about 10 points behind the latter. A WDIV/Detroit News Glengariff poll released Tuesday, on the other hand, had El-Sayed up 6 and Benson up 7, almost identical. Meanwhile, Peltola benefits from a unique election system. Setting its (dubious) legal merits aside, the Trump administration’s recent announcement that it was suing to block certification of the election if Peltola won also does not exactly telegraph confidence in the GOP’s chances.

Sabato has Alaska and Michigan as “at least leaning to Democrats for the past several weeks” but sticks with the tossup label.

Ohio is even more likely. Can never be too cautious I guess.

Sabato says “We have already leaned Ohio’s governor race to Democrats, and that’s probably where we’ll end up in the Senate race barring clear evidence to the contrary.“

Taking a Last Minute Stand

Per Crystal Ball tradition, we will boldly, or sheepishly, push all the Toss-ups to Leans before the election. 

Gee. How bold.

I guess Sabato does not want to go down as not making a call on six races so they will reluctantly do something.

OK enough of this, as it was not the point of this post anyway. Rather I want to discuss Sue Collins, but the lead WSJ chart on tossups got me on this side rant.

Susan Collins Tries to Outrun Trump’s Shadow in Bid for Sixth Senate Term

Please consider Susan Collins Tries to Outrun Trump’s Shadow in Bid for Sixth Senate Term

In 2024, Collins was re-elected by a comfortable margin—despite trailing in opinion polls for most of the race—as Trump was losing Maine by 9 percentage points. Polls are tight again this time.

[Mish Note: Collins was first elected to the Senate in 1996 and has been reelected every six years since. She was reelected in 2002, 2008, 2014, and 2020. In 2020, she made history by becoming the first-ever Republican woman to win a 5th term. The Journal meant 2020 not 2024.]

Collins’s re-election prospects have been threatened by a series of obstacles, many imposed by Trump: He remains deeply unpopular in Maine, and Collins’s opponent, Jackson, a former state senator, constantly points to her votes siding with the president.

The Trump administration is in the middle of a trade war with Canada, Maine’s top trading partner. Fuel prices remain high, including the cost of home heating oil, which has nearly doubled in the past year, as Maine residents prepare for winter.

‘Soul of the Senate’

A Collins victory would cement her status as a giant in American politics and a figure with a nearly unmatched ability to occupy the nation’s shrinking political center. If she loses, her defeat will show the electoral limits of centrist GOP candidates running away from Trump in blue-leaning states.

“You lose Susan Collins, you lose the soul of the Senate,” said former Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia, a Democrat-turned-Independent who campaigned alongside Collins last week at a New Balance factory in Norway, Maine.

In interactions with reporters, Collins frequently notes the times she has broken with Trump and the steps she has taken to soften the blow of tariffs and fuel costs.

She describes herself as the leading opponent of the Canadian tariffs, pointing to exemptions she has helped win for cement and road salt. Last week, she secured exceptions for some products used in agriculture, a boon for the state’s blueberry, apple and potato farmers.

She has spent much of the fall working with the Trump administration to release emergency stocks of home-heating oil. She also has clashed with White House budget chief Russ Vought over administration efforts to cut funding already signed into law.

Collins has supported abortion rights and noted that Jackson sided with antiabortion legislators roughly a decade ago. Collins has repeatedly won re-election by carrying moderate women, helping her stem losses in Democratic-friendly coastal towns in southern Maine. But there have been signs that her vote to confirm Kavanaugh—and the high court’s ruling ending a constitutional right to an abortion—might have damaged her brand.

“That’s what sealed the deal. I was never going to vote for her again,” said Devan Weber, 44, an elementary-school teacher from York in southern Maine. Weber, a Democrat, said she voted for Collins in four consecutive Senate elections, including in 2020.

Home pelted with eggs
Since Collins’s 2018 vote to confirm Kavanaugh, local police have conducted more than 500 checks of her home in Bangor, Maine, according to an August report in the Bangor Daily News. Her home was pelted with eggs in September and, later in the month, her Biddeford regional office was vandalized.

Trade Sue Collins for Troy Jackson?

Say what you want, but Collins has probably been good for Maine, on average. She stood up to Trump enough times for him to threaten to primary her.

Trump is now sucking up to Collins a bit because he now needs her.

As for Kavanaugh, please stop and think what we might have instead. Kavanaugh, Gorsuch, and Barrett have all cast key votes against Trump.

Barret has turned out to be very good. It is a big mistake to view everything through a Roe v. Wade lens.

Why Maine Is a 2026 Senate Bellwether

The WSJ Editorial Board explains Why Maine Is a 2026 Senate Bellwether

Progressives have made electing challenger Troy Jackson a priority, as important to their future as Michigan’s radical candidate Abdul El-Sayed. The Democrats who have campaigned for the former state Senator tell the tale: Sens. Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Mr. Jackson was a leading supporter in Maine of Mr. Sanders’s presidential campaigns in 2016 and 2020.

By telling contrast, former West Virginia Democrat Joe Manchin campaigned for Ms. Collins. The point is that victory or defeat in the Maine race will count for more than one Senate vote. It will also influence the tilt and culture of the next Senate and both political parties.

Mr. Jackson has changed from his younger days when he was notably anti-abortion to become a man of the left. He now favors Medicare for All without acknowledging that Mr. Sanders’s bill establishing it would outlaw private insurance and cost some $30 trillion. He supports a wealth tax and a 4% surtax on annual income above $1 million.

He says he won’t support Chuck Schumer for Democratic leader because the New Yorker isn’t partisan enough. (Mr. Schumer supports him anyway.) Mr. Jackson says Israel has committed genocide in Gaza and he’d cut off military aid to the Jewish state. He’d abolish ICE.

As leader of the Maine Senate from 2018-2024, he led a sharp move to the policy left. The cost of a benchmark ObamaCare plan in Maine is 77% higher than across the border in New Hampshire because of Maine’s regulation and less competition. It’s fair to say Mr. Jackson would join the Senate’s no-compromise hard-left caucus.

Ms. Collins has had a markedly different record in office. She’s a centrist in the GOP’s majority and is known for working across the aisle with the likes of Mr. Manchin. This can sometimes frustrate conservatives, including us on spending from her seat on Appropriations. But there’s no doubt she has delivered for Maine, especially the poor parts of the state that aren’t dominated by the gentry left as Portland is.

Ms. Collins has also been able to soften some of the Administration’s destructive policies. She opposes President Trump’s 50% border tax on Canada, and she has won multiple exemptions such as on road salt, cement and pulp for Maine’s paper mills. Last Friday her lobbying paid off in new exemptions on many more specific products from Canada.

The Maine contest will also influence how the two main parties proceed in the next two years. A Jackson victory, along with one by Mr. El-Sayed in Michigan, will advance the left’s growing strength in the Democratic Party. More Democratic socialists will run in primaries. And Ms. Ocasio-Cortez might take it as a signal to run for President rather than against Mr. Schumer for Senate in New York.

We Need More of This

That is a bit late as the Governor’s race is decided. Yet, it’s still very unusual if not unheard of.

Ohio Governor DeWine should have done the same thing against Ramaswamy.

DeWine did get the ire of Trump for disapproving Ramaswamy’s attack ad.

Where to Draw the Line

There’s an overwhelming desire to smack it to Trump so hard his head spins. But that’s not necessarily the best way to proceed.

The question voters have in at least two states (Ohio and Texas) is where to draw the line.

Under no circumstances could I vote for pedophile protecting Paxton for Senate in Texas or Ramaswamy for Governor of Ohio. Both are evil, despicable persons.

But do I want Collins or a radical socialist in Maine?

The bad news is the Democrat’s candidates in Michigan and Maine truly suck. The good news is Democrats have untraditional candidates in Alaska and Kansas.

The key point of this article is the county does not need this radical Left vs radical Right battle where everyone loses no matter who wins.

Trump demands perfect loyalty, 100 percent of the time. Paxton is the result. The nation is sick of that, even if not thrilled by the alternate choices.

For now, the primary mission is total repudiation of MAGA.

As a Libertarian, I never fully like any of them anyway. But if Paxton goes down, Democrats take the Senate, and Collins holds on, we will have a very good outcome, arguably the best outcome.