Everyone Knows Susan Collins. Troy Jackson Is Still Introducing Himself.

WINDSOR, Maine — Susan Collins needs no introduction here.

The five-term Republican senator received a bit of celebrity treatment on Saturday at the Windsor Fair, a 10-day spectacle that includes livestock shows, amusement rides and rows of booths selling fried foods. Dozens of people stopped Collins as she walked around, flanked by staff and supporters in red t-shirts. Men and women stopped to take photos with her. Parents pointed her out to their children, or asked for a photo with the whole family. Some thanked her for her work generally or on legislation — and some named specific projects.

It’s the kind of hyperlocal retail politics scene that’s core to Collins’ campaign — a stark contrast from the crowded union hall an hour west in the town of Jay, where her Democratic opponent, Troy Jackson, geared up for questions.

Jackson was still introducing himself to voters: He spoke of his upbringing in the logging industry, his struggles of working long hours and still feeling like he couldn’t provide for his family and how he entered the labor movement and politics to fight for the working class. He drew applause by promising to push back on the Iran war, ICE and President Donald Trump’s tax cuts.

“Our challenge in this race is to have enough people get to know him,” said Cynthia Phinney, the longtime Maine AFL-CIO president and a Jackson ally.

The split screen of events highlights how the Collins and Jackson campaigns are operating from different starting points and around entirely different framings of the issues at stake in one of the most highly watched Senate races in the country.

Jackson is still scrambling to build his statewide name recognition — his weekend itinerary included a dozen public events, from Kittery at the southern tip of the state, to Orono, roughly 150 miles north and home to the University of Maine — and focused on tying Collins to Trump and framing the election as a choice between the working people and the billionaire class.

His challenge is doing that against an opponent who has carved out a brand as an independent and long defied partisan trends, including winning reelection in 2020 despite Joe Biden defeating Trump in the state handily. And while Jackson is hoping to capitalize on anti-incumbency sentiment amid frustrations over high prices on everything from gas to health care, he is operating on a shortened timeline and in the face of a barrage of attack ads. Republicans have outspent Democrats in the race by $10 million since the start of August, according to the tracking firm AdImpact.

Collins, who is known for her seniority in the Senate and well-regarded constituent services, is seeking to remind the state’s voters what they would lose if they oust her.

In stop after stop on the campaign trail she points to projects she has brought home funds for — a reminder of her role chairing the powerful appropriations committee, which has helped her secure hundreds of millions of dollars in earmarks for the state. It’s how she has long campaigned, and Jackson’s emergence as her opponent hasn’t changed that strategy.

“It takes time to build up the seniority and the positions on committees to be able to deliver that kind of funding,” she told reporters at the Windsor Fair. “That all would go away if Troy were elected.”

In Windsor, she visited the site of a planned new agricultural center aiming to boost workforce development for farmers. Collins has requested a $2.1 million earmark to help fund it in the upcoming fiscal year.

“We cannot raise this kind of money in the community,” said Ryan Martin, a local agriculture consultant who wrote the congressionally directed spending request that Collins ultimately sponsored. “It’s why the senator’s support is so important.”

Tonya Madden, a resident of nearby Union, was at the fair with her fiancé when she heard Collins was there too. The pair were eager to take a photo with the sitting senator, who they plan to support in November.

“She’s somebody that’s been a powerful woman, working for the state since I was a kid,” Madden said.

Not everyone was a fan. One woman approached the Maine senator and shook her hand, only to say that she was a Democrat who used to vote for Collins — the kind of voter who made Collins’ repeated electoral successes possible — but now hopes she loses reelection after her vote to confirm Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh.

The Jackson campaign is counting on those former supporters who disagree with Collins outweighing the many who have stuck with her. His events attract some voters who say they cast their ballots for Collins at some point, but no longer will.

And he’s still introducing himself to much of the state. Many who are skeptical of Collins liked what they saw from him — although they worried whether he was getting his message out fast enough.

Diane Whiteside, who supported Collins much earlier in the senator’s career, welcomed Jackson to her backyard at a mobile home park in the southern Maine town of Wells, where she and a group of other residents relayed their challenges with rising lot costs and dirty well water. Jackson didn’t have all the answers, but told attendees he’d seek to learn more about the issue from Sen. Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.), who has led a congressional investigation into corporate ownership practices.

“I was really happy that he came,” said Whiteside, who said she was eager to vote for Jackson after the visit. “I think he needs to do more things like this.”

Jackson, at times, seems uncomfortable with the spotlight of the Senate race. A state legislator for two decades, he rose to Senate president but remained relatively unknown outside of labor circles and his northern Maine district before coming in third in the Democratic gubernatorial primary in June. A month later, Graham Platner’s Senate campaign collapsed and Jackson, with the backing of labor organizers, easily won the special convention to replace him as the party’s nominee.

Speaking to supporters in Jay, he shouted out down-ballot candidates and reminded attendees of the importance of keeping control of the Maine legislature to support progressive governance in the state.

“What I know is that people across the state want to change. And it isn't me. It isn't because of Troy Jackson, they want change,” he said. “And I'm very excited to be just part of this, because this movement is happening.”

Linda Dean, a retired steelworker from Rumford, asked Jackson about the flood of negative ads that had hit the airwaves in recent weeks. Some of those ads attacked his son’s work as a lobbyist and reimbursements for travel and meals Jackson collected while serving in the state legislature despite having bought a home closer to the state capitol in Augusta.

Jackson characterized the claims as lies, noting his son hardly got rich from lobbying and worked this year as a park ranger, and said the home purchase was “the biggest mistake I ever made.” (Jackson ended up in a legal dispute with the former owners and later sold the property.) But the candidate told Dean that he didn’t know if the campaign would respond with ads of its own; he was being outspent on the airwaves by Collins and her allies and would rather devote his time to talking about policies.

“This whole thing is just designed to make people think that I’m a dirtbag,” he said. “And you know, I get it. But I want to talk about the issues.”

The next morning in South Portland, Elizabeth Biermann and her husband, David, happened to end up at the same coffee spot where Jackson was set to chat with nurses union members and friends. The couple has one of his lawn signs in their yard and were excited to meet him and express their support.

Jackson, circling the room to shake hands with attendees, thanked both of them for coming, and chatted for a few minutes about the campaign.

“The ads haven’t been fun,” he said, “but everything else is great.”