Susan Collins

(born 1952)

“Our success multiplies each time we lead someone else to success.”

Years in political office: 1996–present

Position: US senator from Maine, 1997–present; former Massachusetts deputy state treasurer, 1993–1994

Party affiliation: Republican

Hometown: Caribou, Maine

Top causes: national security, health care, women’s health, and education

Life Story

Susan Margaret Collins was born December 7, 1952, to a family of lumber company owners, judges, and political leaders. Both her parents served as mayor of the little town of Caribou, Maine, where she was raised. Her father was part of her family’s four generations of state legislators, and her mother was on the boards of organizations such as the Catholic Charities of Maine.

In school, Collins shone. She represented Maine in the US Senate Youth Program and spent a month in Washington, DC, meeting the country’s top politicians. There, she had a two-hour-long conversation with Maine senator Margaret Chase Smith—the first woman ever to be elected to both the House and Senate. Collins’s exchange with Smith inspired her to consider a political career.

In high school, she had a job at the Caribou Public Library reading books to children. She credits those story hours for her high regard of the importance of education. Collins got the second-best grades in her graduating class at Caribou High School and received Phi Beta Kappa honors in college.

At the age of fifty-nine, Collins married Thomas Daffron, whom she had met when she was a twenty-one-year-old congressional intern. As a testament to Collins’s high standing, the Senate halted their discussion of a highway bill and adjourned early so members could attend the engagement party, which was hosted by Hillary Clinton (page 22).

What’s on Her Agenda

Collins got going in politics right after graduating from college. She worked in the office of US representative—and subsequent senator—William Cohen for more than a decade. She later became Maine governor John McKernan Jr.’s commissioner of professional and financial regulation. Her talent gained nationwide recognition when President George H. W. Bush made her regional director for the federal Small Business Administration.

In 1994 she decided to run for an elected position and beat out seven other Republicans in the governor’s race to become the first woman from a major party nominated for the position in Maine. She was eventually bested by the Democratic candidate, but maybe it was meant to be. Two years later, Collins won the election to become one of Maine’s national senators. She was immediately appointed chairperson of the permanent subcommittee on investigations, a position which a woman had never held before, and used her role to expose Medicare scams that affected US residents’ pocketbooks. Her debut Senate vote was to confirm Madeleine Albright as the country’s first woman secretary of state—historic indeed.

Collins has held onto her Senate seat ever since, earning a reputation as an independent voter who takes her time to research issues. She’s famously cast votes against the Republican party line on national health care, same-sex marriage, and abortion rights. When Georgetown University cosponsored a study of senators’ voting records from 1993–2014, she was named the most bipartisan current member of the US Senate, a title that gave her a lot of strategic power in close votes within the two-party system.

That reputation of bipartisanship did get tarnished in the polarizing Trump administration, during which Collins’s reputation as a swing voter put her in some hopeless political situations. In 2018 the senator weathered the biggest controversy of her career when she became one of the key votes in the confirmation of Supreme Court justice Brett Kavanaugh. Kavanaugh, nominated by Trump, had been accused by Christine Blasey Ford of attempting to rape her when they were adolescents. Aghast (and politically motivated) Democrats were adamant that he not serve in the nation’s highest court, where he would likely be voting on issues important to many women, such as the survival of Roe v. Wade. After a period of intense media speculation on her vote, and pressure from both sides of the aisle, Collins delivered a forty-five-minute speech in favor of Kavanaugh on the Senate floor.

In the run-up to her 2020 reelection bid, Collins has already sought opportunities to regain the liberal base who felt betrayed by her after the Kavanaugh toss-up. In 2019, for example, she opposed Trump’s nominee for a northern Texas district judge, Matthew Kacsmaryk, who had previously called pro-choice activists “sexual revolutionaries.” Overall, Collins votes along with Trump’s positions 69 percent of the time.

Awesome Achievements

Quotables

“Unconstrained and unfettered and unvetted, I marched over to the Senate floor, took the microphone and challenged our colleagues to come out of their partisan corners, to stop the fighting and to start legislating in a manner worthy of the people of this country.”

“Our first responsibility as a leader is to create an attractive dream, to proclaim a destination, communicating it in detail to others who might be interested in joining our expedition.”

“If you don’t know what you want, you’ll probably get what somebody else wants.”

“Voting is a Senator’s most important responsibility, and I feel strongly about making every effort possible to be present to make sure Mainers’ voices are heard.”