Troy Jackson Holds a Narrow Lead Over Collins — But History and Money Could Change

Three weeks before voters in Maine decide, the U.S. Senate race between Democrat Troy Jackson and Republican incumbent Susan Collins has become the national election's most closely watched single contest — and the one with the least certain outcome. Jackson holds a polling edge that ranges from a single percentage point to four, depending on which survey you trust. Collins holds a documented ability to outrun numbers like those when votes actually get counted.

A Race Nobody Expected to Look Like This

Jackson, 58, arrived at this contest through an opening few political veterans anticipated. Graham Platner — the Democrat who won Maine's party primary in June — suspended his campaign in July after a sexual assault allegation that he publicly denied. With a July 27 replacement deadline bearing down, Maine Democrats convened an emergency nominating convention in Bangor and chose Jackson, a fifth-generation logger from Allagash who had previously served as president of the Maine Senate. He entered the fall campaign with no pre-assembled infrastructure and fewer than 16 weeks to build a statewide profile capable of unseating a five-term incumbent.

Collins, 73, carried no such disadvantages into this rematch. Serving as chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee — the first Republican woman to hold that post — she has campaigned relentlessly on the practical return that seniority delivers: her office claims more than $1.5 billion in congressional spending directed to nearly 700 Maine projects over five years. The Senate Leadership Fund committed over $42 million against Jackson the same day he secured the Democratic nomination. Elon Musk's America PAC has since entered the race on Collins' behalf, with initial spending channeled through Maine-based print vendors.

The Polls: What They Show — and What They Don't Settle

Recent surveys frame the race from multiple angles. A Washington Post–Schar School poll of 800 likely voters, fielded September 30 through October 5, gives Jackson 50 percent to Collins' 46 — a four-point lead within the survey's sampling error. A Marist University poll of 1,505 Maine registered voters from October 1–4 mirrors that gap: Jackson 51 percent, Collins 47. A University of New Hampshire survey puts Jackson's advantage at four points as well, while a Maine People's Resource Center poll narrows his lead to two.

Not all the evidence points Jackson's way. A New York Times/Siena Research Institute/Portland Press Herald poll conducted September 15–22 found Collins at 49 percent to Jackson's 46 — her first lead in any independent survey since he joined the race. A CBS News/YouGov survey released October 2 showed an outright tie. The conservative RealClearPolitics polling average, which weights the full field of surveys, stands at Jackson +1.

Prediction markets on Polymarket priced Jackson's probability of winning at approximately 59 percent in early October, down from over 70 percent in September before the Times poll put Collins briefly in front.

The fine print on Collins' side is impossible to ignore. In 2020, she won re-election by nearly 9 points over Democratic nominee Sara Gideon, defying polls that had shown her trailing for most of the cycle. Collins still projects strength among the voters most likely to actually determine this race: an AARP survey of 982 likely voters taken September 20–22 found that she captures 53 percent of voters aged 50 and older against Jackson's 44, and leads 70 to 17 percent among the persuadable swing voters in that age group. Jackson holds a 25-point advantage with voters under 50 — but Maine has the oldest median population of any state in the country.

Money and the Air War

Maine's ad war has already broken most historical benchmarks for the state. AdImpact tracking data showed Republican-aligned groups logging over $128 million in total ad spending and reservations as of early September, compared with approximately $81 million from Democratic-aligned organizations. Total race spending is projected to clear $400 million, with some earlier estimates pointing to a figure approaching $500 million once all platforms are counted. Republicans hold a roughly 21 percent volume advantage across Maine's three major broadcast markets, according to the Bangor Daily News.

Kavanaugh, ICE and the Debate Battlefield

Jackson and Collins met for the first of four planned televised debates on October 7 — Collins' first time on a Maine debate stage in roughly six years — and the ninety-minute exchange captured precisely why this race remains genuinely competitive. Jackson opened by invoking Collins' 2018 vote to confirm Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, who later cast one of the deciding votes to overturn Roe v. Wade. Collins maintained that Kavanaugh had given her private assurances the precedent was settled, and she declined to say the vote was a mistake.

Collins, in turn, sought to put the state's affordability struggles on Jackson's shoulders: she cited what she called "Augusta's failed policies" and linked rising housing and electricity costs to the period when he led the Maine Senate. Jackson deflected responsibility to Washington and to Collins' procedural support for Republican budget measures he argued have squeezed working Maine families. Collins also highlighted tariff exemptions she helped secure for Maine export products including pulp and road salt, prompting Jackson to quip, "We can't eat road salt."

The sharpest policy divide came on immigration enforcement. Jackson supports abolishing U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement — a position Collins called untenable — while Collins called for the agency's structural reform, pointing to the July death of a Colombian man shot by an ICE agent in Maine as evidence that significant changes were needed without dismantling the agency outright.

The Electorate — and the National Forces Behind the Race

President Trump's job approval rating in Maine sits at 40 percent among registered voters, according to the same Marist poll that measured the Senate contest. That number anchors Jackson's core campaign logic: the more this race becomes a national referendum on the president, the harder it becomes for Collins to run on her centrist record. Former President Barack Obama formalized his backing for Jackson last Thursday in a video endorsement, praising him as a working-class champion who, as Maine Senate president, fought to raise wages, reduce prescription drug costs and expand access to school meals. Jackson has also drawn substantial crowds to community town halls across the state — events Collins has more rarely held in the same open format.

Independents remain a critical swing bloc. Jackson held a 13-point edge with that group in the Washington Post poll. Collins, however, continues to cross partisan lines in ways few Republicans nationally can replicate: the Times poll found her winning roughly 12 percent of voters who backed Democrat Kamala Harris in the 2024 presidential race.

What's Actually at Stake

Republicans hold the U.S. Senate 53 to 47, with two independents counted among those who caucus with Democrats. Democrats must net four seats in November to claim a majority. Maine represents their clearest opportunity: it is the only Republican-held seat in a state where Donald Trump has failed to win across his three presidential campaigns. Democrats have not captured a U.S. Senate seat in Maine since 1988 — a streak that explains both the national money pouring into Jackson's campaign and the persistent anxiety inside Democratic circles despite his polling lead.

With three weeks remaining, the math is unsparing on both sides. Collins must move voters in a state where the political atmosphere runs against her party. Jackson must hold his lead and convince enough older, pragmatic Maine voters that a freshman senator — no matter how well-connected he becomes — is worth trading the seniority Collins has spent thirty years accumulating.

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