Democrat Troy Jackson defeated longtime Republican Senator Susan Collins, unseating the five-term incumbent who has represented Maine since 1997 and ending her reign as the longest-serving active GOP woman in the Senate.
CNN and NBC called the race for Jackson around midnight. He was ahead 52 percent to Collins' 47 percent with 67 percent of the vote counted, according to the Associated Press.
The five-term Republican suffered one of the biggest defeats of her political career, ending her nearly three-decade tenure in the Senate and dashing her hopes of becoming the longest-serving senator in Maine's history.
She graciously conceded in a short call with Jackson shortly after the race was called.
Jackson's victory hands Democrats a crucial Republican-held seat as a 'blue tsunami' takes hold.
The GOP went into the evening with a 53 to 47 majority, meaning Democrats needed a net gain of four seats to take power, given that Vice President JD Vance breaks any 50 to 50 tie.
Democrats quickly flipped North Carolina, South Carolina, Maine, Kansas, Iowa, and Texas in a bloodbath for the GOP.
Collins was the only GOP senator on the ballot this year in a state that former VP Kamala Harris carried in 2024, making Maine the first domino on the Democrats' path to power.
A Republican network of super PACs and nonprofits booked about $126 million in ads in a failed bid to re-elect Collins.
Democrat Troy Jackson defeated longtime Republican Senator Susan Collins
The five-term Republican suffered one of the biggest defeats of her political career, ending her nearly three-decade tenure in the Senate and dashing her hopes of becoming the longest-serving senator in Maine's history
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The win is an awkward one for Trump, who wrote in January that Collins 'should never be elected to office again' after she voted to rein in the president's military powers following his successful operation in Venezuela that month.
Collins broke with Trump on some of the biggest votes of his second term, opposing Pete Hegseth's confirmation as defense secretary and voting against the final passage of his One Big Beautiful Bill.
Her survival keeps a famously independent vote in the GOP conference, meaning Trump's agenda still runs through a senator who has repeatedly refused to rubber-stamp it.
Voters across Maine told the Daily Mail in the week leading up to the election that they would stick with Collins due to their lack of familiarity with Jackson.
The logger and local lawmaker was not even Democrats' first choice, stepping in after primary winner Graham Platner, who took 72 percent of the June vote, quit the race in July over a sexual assault allegation he has denied.
Delegates at a party convention in Bangor picked Jackson as the replacement on July 25, giving him a 101-day sprint to unseat a senator who has beaten every Democrat thrown at her since 1996.
Jackson had just lost the Democratic primary for governor to Hannah Pingree weeks before being tapped as a blue-collar rival to Collins, who he has attacked as a Trump enabler.
The race also turned nasty in its final days when a Republican super PAC aired a radio jingle calling Jackson a 'freak' and a 'creep,' a spot Collins herself said should be taken down.
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Money poured in on both sides, with Jackson raising $26.9 million in barely three months against $22.5 million raised by Collins over the full cycle, according to federal filings through October 14.
The final polls ahead of Election Day showed a dead heat, with Marist putting Jackson ahead 49 to 47 among likely voters, CNN putting him up 49 to 45 and Trafalgar giving Collins a hair-thin 47 to 46.5 edge.
Though many surveys showed her well within the poll's margin of error, meaning the race was a true toss-up.
As chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, Collins pitched her clout. In a Washington Post-Schar School poll, voters gave her a 24-point edge on bringing federal dollars to Maine.
Collins has a long history of embarrassing pollsters, having trailed for much of 2020 before winning that race by over eight points.
Trump himself was a drag in Maine, where Marist found 58 percent of likely voters disapproved of the job he is doing and 41 percent said their vote was a vote against him.
Her win will let Republicans argue that the anti-Trump wave was not big enough to sink a well-known incumbent, even in a state he has lost three times.
With Republican control of the Senate, the outcome in Maine sets the tone for the final two years of Trump's presidency and the opening shots of the 2028 race to succeed him.
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