In an interview over the weekend, Senator Susan Collins refused to answer when NewsCenter Maine’s Pat Callaghan asked her whether she voted for Donald Trump in Maine’s presidential primary. Collins admitted that she has already voted by absentee ballot, but refused to say who she voted for on the presidential ballot. While she is dodging the question about her vote in the presidential primary, Collins' record in Congress has been clear – she voted with Donald Trump 94% of the time, and he has endorsed her campaign.

 

WATCH:

 

 

Pat Callaghan: Are you planning to vote in Tuesday’s presidential primary? And will you be supporting President Trump or writing in someone else as you did in 2016?

Senator Collins: I have voted by absentee ballot just to make sure that I voted... I’m focused on my job and also on my own campaign and I’m just not going to get involved in presidential politics.

 

Now, with only 14 days to the Republican filing deadline, Senator Collins’ evasive answer is making headlines. Read more:

 

HuffPost: Susan Collins Won’t Say If She Voted For Trump In 2020 Republican Primary

 

By Hayley Miller

March 1, 2020

 

Key Points:

 

  • After vowing not to vote for then-candidate Donald Trump in 2016, citing his “lack of self-restraint” and “unsuitability for office,” Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) has taken a decidedly more restrained approach to his reelection bid in 2020.

 

  • The Maine senator, who is facing what’s shaping up to be the toughest reelection race of her career, wouldn’t say during a recent interview with a local TV news program whether she’s voting for Trump in her state’s upcoming primary.

 

  • Collins said she voted by absentee ballot ahead of Maine’s March 3 primary, but didn’t say whether she cast her ballot for Trump. The president is the only candidate listed on Maine’s Republican primary ballot this year, along with the option to write in another name.

 

  • Though she wrote an op-ed bashing Trump three months before the 2016 election, Collins said she isn’t going to “get involved in presidential politics” this time around.

 

  • Trump, on the other hand, has seemingly endorsed Collins in Maine’s 2020 Senate race. He tweeted in December that he “100%” agreed with Sen. Lindsey Graham’s (R-S.C.) call for voters to support Collins, and Trump’s campaign staffers in Maine have been collecting signatures to get her on the ballot.

 

The New York Times: Susan Collins won’t say if she voted for Trump.

 

By Neil VIgdor

March 1, 2020

 

Key Points:

 

  • Senator Susan Collins, the centrist Maine Republican who is facing a tough re-election and has drawn the ire of many of her constituents because of her vote to acquit President Trump on impeachment charges, is sidestepping questions about whether she cast a primary ballot for him.

 

  • In 2016, Ms. Collins declined to vote for Mr. Trump in the general election and has said that she wrote in the name of Paul D. Ryan, a fellow Republican who was House Speaker at the time.

 

  • Last month, she inflamed proponents of Mr. Trump’s impeachment when she told CBS that Mr. Trump had learned a “pretty big lesson.”

 

  • In addition to her acquittal vote, Ms. Collins has caught flak for her vote to confirm Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court in 2018.

 

  • According to the polling service Morning Consult, Ms. Collins had a disapproval rating of 52 percent in the fourth quarter of 2019, the highest of any senator.

 

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