Augusta, ME – Today, a new report in the Bangor Daily News revealed even more shady ties between Susan Collins, the lobbyist running her Super PAC, and dark money organizations. Last year, as Scott Reed’s consulting firm was paying Collins’ husband at least $1,000, the firm took hundreds of thousands of dollars from a mysterious firm to lobby Collins’ committee. According to the report, the group even took its name from a Collins hearing and “has never said who funded it.”

In response to these new revelations, Misha Linnehan, spokesperson for the Maine Democratic Party, released the following statement:

“Another day, another shady tie between Susan Collins and the lobbyist who helped coordinate an illegal pay-to-play scheme. Mainers are sick of this which is why next week we’re going to elect Troy Jackson, who will fight for Mainers instead of cozying up to lobbyists and dark money super PACs.”

Read more here:

Bangor Daily News: Susan Collins’ super PAC chief lobbied for a mystery group

• Scott Reed, the Republican strategist leading a super PAC spending heavily to reelect U.S. Sen. Susan Collins, was paid last year to lobby Congress on her signature issue by a group that has never said who funded it.

• The group, Keeping America’s Edge, took its name from an April 2025 hearing Collins chaired on biomedical research. It formed nine days later and paid Reed’s firm and two others a combined $850,000 to lobby on funding for the National Institutes of Health, according to federal lobbying reports. It dissolved in July, telling regulators it never “commenced business.” […]

• …the group adds to a web of ties between Collins and Reed, a longtime friend and former colleague of her husband, that has drawn scrutiny in the final weeks of her race against Democrat Troy Jackson.

• Reed chairs Pine Tree Results, the super PAC that has booked nearly $32 million in ads backing Collins, according to AdImpact data. His lobbying firm, Chesapeake Enterprises, paid her husband, Tom Daffron, a consulting fee in 2025, according to her financial disclosure. Neither Reed nor Collins’ office has said what Daffron did or how much he was paid.

• “There is always the risk of an appearance of a conflict of interest when a lobbying firm pays a lawmaker’s spouse, especially if the firm lobbies that lawmaker,” said Brendan Fischer of the Campaign Legal Center, a left-leaning watchdog group.

• Reed has drawn complaints from watchdogs before. About a decade ago, the Campaign Legal Center accused a Reed-linked group of violating campaign finance law. Around the same time, the liberal Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington said Chesapeake had failed to file required lobbying reports.

• Last month, ProPublica reported that FBI agents had examined a now-imprisoned defense contractor’s claim that Reed promised Collins would know the source of an illegal $150,000 donation to his previous pro-Collins super PAC in 2019. […]

• Keeping America’s Edge was incorporated May 9. Five days later it hired Chesapeake, which listed Reed as its only lobbyist on the account and reported $250,000 for work on “NIH Funding” before the House and Senate. In June, the group added Miller Strategies, which reported $460,000, and Venture Government Strategies, which reported $140,000 and whose lobbyist Hamilton Bloom is a former Senate Appropriations subcommittee staff director. The work ended by January 2026.

• While Chesapeake was lobbying for the group, Reed gave Collins’ campaign $7,000. Bloom and a Venture colleague gave Collins committees a combined $9,000 in March 2026.

• The lobbying reports name no bill provision or dollar figure. Collins’ office said nothing in the Senate’s ensuing health spending bill reflected the group’s requests.

• Berke attested in July that the group “has not commenced business” and that “no debt of the corporation remains unpaid.” That is difficult to square with lobbying reports listing the same Pennsylvania Avenue suite as the client’s address and $850,000 in fees.