MAINE — U.S. Sen. Susan Collins formally launched her bid for a sixth term at the Maine Republican Party state convention in Augusta last month, debuting her first general election advertisement. The ad featured federal funding she secured to repair a collapsed pier in Eastport, Maine.

"I'm going to be talking about my record of delivering for my beloved state," Collins, the incumbent Republican, said at the convention. She said she would emphasize her seniority as chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee and the influence she has built over nearly 30 years in the Senate.

Democrats have identified the Maine Senate seat as one of four they believe they can pick up to regain control of the U.S. Senate in the upcoming election. The top Senate GOP Super PAC has invested $42 million in the race, with additional outside spending being directed into the contest.

The presumptive Democratic nominee is Graham Platner, a 41-year-old Marine veteran and oysterman with no national political experience. Janet Mills, the two-term governor of Maine, suspended her campaign for the Democratic Senate primary, citing dwindling financial resources. Reports have surfaced of racist, sexist, and homophobic online posts by Platner, as well as a tattoo resembling a Nazi symbol, which he has since covered up. Platner has drawn hundreds of Mainers to town halls across the state. In a recent advertisement, Platner described Collins's breaks with President Donald Trump as "symbolic opposition" that do not "reopen hospitals" or "bring back Roe v Wade." In the same ad, he accused Collins of selling out working-class Mainers to Trump and the "Epstein class."

Collins, 73, voted to convict Trump in his second impeachment trial following the January 6 insurrection. She opposed Pete Hegseth's nomination for U.S. Secretary of Defense and voted to confirm Ketanji Brown Jackson as a Supreme Court justice. She also voted to confirm Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court, supported a national voter identification bill, and delayed her backing of a war powers resolution on Iran. Earlier this year, she was photographed holding a "Make America Great Again" hat in the Oval Office.

Early polls show Collins trailing Platner by single-digit percentages in hypothetical matchups, though she has previously survived cases of poor polling. Jeffrey Selinger, a professor of government at Bowdoin College, said the senator's path forward depends partly on Trump's posture toward her campaign. "She really needs silence from [Trump], and he's not good at that," Selinger said. "She has to not poke the bear, but then still claim credit for things that she thinks she did well."