With Maine facing a $1.4 billion budget shortfall, Senator Susan Collins has taken off for her long summer break after failing to negotiate a coronavirus aid deal or secure any funding for struggling state and local governments.
Local Maine officials have been speaking out about the state’s financial crisis, detailing how municipalities will be forced to cut essential services without additional federal support. But even after claiming that getting a bipartisan deal to secure more federal funding for Maine’s cities and towns was among her “top priorities,” Senator Collins failed to secure even a single dollar of state and local funding in the Republican coronavirus relief proposal. And rather than working to make a deal to ensure Maine communities could continue to fund public health and safety through the coronavirus crisis, she “retreated to her partisan corner” before taking off for a nearly month-long vacation with no progress on a coronavirus relief bill.
“Susan Collins should be in the Senate fighting for Maine communities, but instead she’s taking nearly a month off,” said Maine Democratic Party Executive Director Lisa Roberts. “Thanks to her failure of leadership, municipalities across the state are facing devastating cuts to essential services in the middle of twin public health and economic crises. Maine deserves a leader who will put our communities first--but Collins has chosen to play political games instead.”
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