President Trump’s immigration crackdown is complicating Republicans’ makes an attempt to keep up management of Congress on this yr’s midterm elections. That dynamic is clear particularly in Maine.
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President Trump’s immigration crackdown is complicating makes an attempt by Republicans to keep up their majorities in Congress. In Maine, Republican Senator Susan Collins now faces probably probably the most tough marketing campaign of her decades-long profession. Kevin Miller with Maine Public Radio has extra.
KEVIN MILLER, BYLINE: As the one Republican senator up for reelection in a state that did not again Donald Trump in 2024, Senator Collins was already thought-about one of many GOP’s most susceptible incumbents. Then got here an immigration enforcement surge, concentrating on among the state’s largest and most numerous communities.
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UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Frigid temperatures didn’t cease ICE from hitting the bottom working right here…
MILLER: Whereas Homeland Safety officers stated they had been concentrating on, quote, “the worst of the worst,” eyewitness stories and movies of masked, closely armed brokers allege they had been casting a a lot wider web – two asylum-seekers legally working at county jails, a month-old child showered with glass after brokers broke a automobile window to snag his father, an immigrant with no legal document. In stepped Collins.
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SUSAN COLLINS: I known as Secretary Noem, whom I do know, and I informed her that I felt that ICE officers had gone too far, that they weren’t specializing in individuals who had been right here illegally and had legal data.
MILLER: That is Collins in a latest interview with Maine Public Radio. The 30-year Senate veteran holds arguably one of the vital influential positions in Congress as chair of the Senate committee that controls federal spending, together with for Secretary Kristi Noem’s company, the Division of Homeland Safety.
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COLLINS: I stored pushing her to droop and stop the improved operation within the state of Maine, and she or he agreed to take action.
MILLER: However Collins’ critics again dwelling aren’t shopping for it.
GRAHAM PLATNER: Susan Collins didn’t make that occur.
MILLER: That is Graham Platner, the gruff-talking oysterman and Democrat, whose explosive Senate marketing campaign has attracted big crowds because the summer time. Platner argues that the actual motive ICE diminished its presence in Maine is as a result of communities organized in opposition to them.
PLATNER: She has performed completely nothing to attempt to rein within the habits of the Trump administration during the last yr. Hell, she did nothing to rein it in final time both.
MILLER: Platner’s chief opponent within the June Democratic major, two-term Governor Janet Mills, has additionally made ICE and the immigration crackdown a key marketing campaign concern. And like Platner, Mills accused Collins of not utilizing her place to push again on ICE.
JANET MILLS: And proper now, she’s voting to fund ICE with none requirements, with none substantive controls, with none accountability.
MILLER: Collins responds to such criticisms by pointing to $22 million for physique cameras and de-escalation coaching for ICE brokers that is within the Republican model of the DHS finances invoice nonetheless stalled in Congress. The company is at the moment shut down as Democrats demand broader reforms inside ICE, corresponding to prohibiting masked brokers earlier than approving funding. Collins says it, quote, “stays to be seen” whether or not President Trump’s insurance policies will probably be a consider her reelection bid.
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COLLINS: I’m working on my document of independence. I assist the president, as I’ve each different president that I’ve labored with, once I assume he’s proper. I oppose them once I assume he’s mistaken.
MILLER: Collins’ repeated use of the phrase independence is strategic. Almost one-third of Maine voters are independents, making them the second largest voting bloc after Democrats. And Collins will want a major variety of unbiased voters to win in November, when many Democrats are anticipated to prove, motivated by their anger over Trump insurance policies, with immigration probably topping that checklist.
For NPR Information, I am Kevin Miller in Augusta, Maine.
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