Augusta, ME – Susan Collins named a former Oath Keeper as a campaign town chair, according to a breaking report from the Daily Beast. This comes as Collins faces criticism after she voted with Trump 96% of the time.
Read more here:
Daily Beast: Republican Senator Faces New Humiliation in Must-Win Seat
September 2, 2026
Susan Collins can’t catch a break. When Democrat firebrand Graham Platner was forced out of the Maine Senate race over a series of abuse allegations, the veteran Republican could have been forgiven for thinking her re-election campaign had just gotten a whole lot easier.
Instead, it’s been one headache after another: billionaire donors with ties to Jeffrey Epstein; a campaign begging supporters for gas money to fuel her re-election tour after she voted to uphold the conflict in Iran; and Donald Trump launching a trade war with neighboring Canada.
Now comes the latest bit of campaign baggage: a former Oath Keeper.
In June, Collins, 73, announced county commissioner Wayne Erkkinen as her town chair in Greenville, which puts him in charge of grassroots campaigns and voter outreach as Collins fights to hold on to her Senate seat at November’s midterm elections.
The problem? Erkkinen, 81, was previously identified by the Anti-Defamation League as a member of the Oath Keepers, the far right extremist group that played a major role in the January 6 attack at the Capitol, with some later convicted of seditious conspiracy.
The group’s leaked membership roles included more than 38,000 names and Erkkinen was among them. He told The Swamp he joined the group in 2010 thinking it was for law enforcement and military veterans like him, who had sworn to defend the constitution. He also said he quit the group “years ago”—before the storming of the Capitol—because he didn’t want to be part of something violent.
“It wasn’t what I thought it would be,” he said.
But his presence is giving Democrats fresh ammunition to argue that the Senator is supported by Donald Trump’s “most extreme backers.” Collins’ camp argues the campaign can’t be expected to keep tabs on every grassroots volunteer on its books. Maybe so, but it’s a somewhat awkward look for a senator who claims to be right in the weeds of Maine’s issues, and whose re-election campaign is already facing questions about the company it keeps.
As we revealed on Monday, Collins has accepted donations from a string of wealthy figures linked to Epstein, including Bill Gates, Leon Black, Casey Wasserman and Peter Thiel. No one has been accused of any wrongdoing, but the optics aren’t great for a Senator who initially voted against releasing the Epstein files.
It’s almost enough for Sen. Collins and her supporters to be, well, very concerned.
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