The Majority Forward PAC is running an insider trading ad against Collins — but two-thirds of Maine voters think she has good character and morals. The smarter play: tie every Collins vote to Trump and the threat of another Trump Supreme Court justice. Don't overthink it.
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At 1:07:30 · chapter starts 1:05:36
Jon opens with a note on Alaska — Nate Cohn has flagged possible methodological issues with the Alaska sample that could make the numbers look worse for Peltola than they are. Then the conversation turns to what is now the centerpiece of the Democratic Senate strategy: Maine. The new Majority Forward ad attacks Susan Collins for opposing a ban on congressional stock trading, framing it as an insider trading enrichment scheme. Dan is skeptical of the strategy: two-thirds of Maine voters think Collins has good character and morals, making it very hard to make a corruption argument land. Collins has always overperformed — up 23 in 2008 when Obama won Maine by 17, up 9 in 2020 when Biden won Maine by 9 — and she's still popular. What the NYT poll does show is that 57% of independents and a majority of all Maine voters think Collins would be too supportive of Trump. That's the door. Dan argues every ad, every dollar, every message should be a variation of: Collins equals Trump. Plattner, for his part, is running roughly one point ahead of where Sarah Gideon was with white working-class voters, and he's doing considerably better with young voters and men — which is why he's leading where Gideon lost by 9. But he's underperforming the generic ballot by about 9 points, partially because some of the revelations about him have suppressed enthusiasm, and partially because Collins still runs as a genuine exception for many Maine voters. The hosts close noting that both Collins and Plattner are more popular than Democratic Governor Janet Mills, and that the Maine economy being rated negatively by more than 80% of voters would have made Mills a harder candidate than Plattner.
Susan Collins won Maine by 9 points in 2020 even as Biden was winning Maine by nearly 9 points — an 18-point overperformance.
In 2008, Susan Collins won Maine by 23 points when Obama won Maine by 17 — a 40-point overperformance illustrating her extraordinary home-state durability.
Nearly 9 in 10 Maine voters have heard about the revelations surrounding Democratic Senate candidate Graham Plattner, a stark contrast to Texas where only 38% heard about Paxton's problems.
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