Augusta, Maine – In case you missed it, Susan Collins said “we’re going to need the evidence […] [of] Americans getting sicker as a result” of the GOP’s cuts to health care in order for her and Congress to address the harm caused by the GOP budget bill that Collins greenlit.

The consequences of the GOP bill Collins advanced are already clear: 61,000 Mainers will lose their health care coverage, thousands of Maine fishermen could lose their MaineCare, a number of rural Maine hospitals will shut down, and clinics will stop services providing everything from cervical cancer screenings to primary care.

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Maine Beacon: “If Americans get sicker,” Congress may revisit Trump budget
By Channa Steinmetz
September 16, 2025

• Sen. Susan Collins suggested Monday that Congress will only take a deeper look at Pres. Donald Trump’s budget bill if evidence shows Americans are becoming sicker as a result of its cuts.

• Speaking at the World Medical Innovation Forum in Boston, Collins acknowledged the legislation’s $1 trillion in health care and food assistance cuts will be “devastating” for rural states like Maine, where 400,000 residents (about one-third of the population) rely on Medicaid.

• “As the implications of the bill become better known, I think there’s going to be tremendous pressure on Congress to change the law, but we’re going to need the evidence, the stories, the research,” Collins said during the fireside chat. “… So if we start seeing America, Americans getting sicker as a result of this, having delayed treatment because they no longer have the coverage — and if it’s combined with changes in the Affordable Care Act that also would restrict coverage or make coverage more expensive to get on the exchange — then I think you will see a lot of pressure to take a better look at this.”

• She warned that five of Maine’s 32 hospitals are already “teetering on the brink of closure.”

• Despite those concerns, Collins was a pivotal vote in June that allowed the Republican budget bill to advance in the Senate. The package, signed into law by Trump on July 4, included massive Medicaid reductions and blocked federal funds from reaching providers such as Maine Family Planning, which says it may be forced to stop offering primary care at its 18 clinics without the funding.

• Health care providers and advocates in Maine warn that 61,000 Mainers will lose coverage, thousands of fishermen could be cut off from MaineCare, and rural hospitals in Presque Isle and Ellsworth face an “imminent risk of closure.”