EDITOR'S NOTE - This reporting comes from Spectrum News and Syracuse University's Newhouse School's partnership.
By: Ben Bascuk
PORTLAND, M.E. – “We're in a very stressed condition. We've got a declining price. And our expenses are going up much more than any of us had planned on,” said Casco Bay lobsterman Steve Train.
Train got his fishing license at 8 years old and spent more than 40 years operating a 46-foot lobster boat named Hattie Rose, hauling 800 traps year-round off the coast of Portland.
Like many on Maine’s working waterfront, Train will head to the polls Tuesday instead of the pier. He faces a choice between Republican incumbent Sen. Susan Collins and Democratic nominee Troy Jackson in a toss-up race that could decide control of the U.S. Senate.
“I'm an independent voter. I'll support Susan Collins and I'll split my ticket,” said Train. “She's always been there for us,” and “I don't know what you want to call her: fairy godmother, patron saint.”
“Diesel matters. When it gets higher, it matters more,” said Train. “We've got a choke point on oil in the Middle East,” and “That's the biggest point driving up the barrel price of oil in the world.”
Train credits President Donald Trump with cutting certain regulations and red tape but says he still can't make money because of other choices made by the administration.
Ninety miles northeast of Portland, along Maine's rocky coast, fifth-generation lobsterman Gerry Cushman says it's Collins, not Trump, on the ballot and that people taking their frustrations out on Collins is “ridiculous.”
Cushman votes Republican most of the time but doesn't look at the party identifier on the ballot. He looks at the person.
“She's courteous and she listens,” said Cushman. “I know where her heart is and I've said this over and over again, she loves Maine.”
“If you love Maine the way I love Maine, and the way my family loves Maine, you will vote for Susan Collins because she can make a change,” said Cushman. “I know Troy Jackson. I've been in the room with Troy Jackson. He loves to play games with politics, and she doesn't play games with politics.”
The Maine Lobstering Union (MLU) is a union-based cooperative and advocacy group representing licensed Maine lobstermen and sternmen. It operates as Local 207 of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAM). IAM endorsed Jackson for U.S. Senate in July 2026.
“I think 30 years of Collins being in Washington is enough,” said David Sullivan, general vice president of IAM's Eastern Territory. “We've had a long working relationship with Troy. His time on the Labor Committee was big, not just for the IAM, but for all the unions here in Maine.”
“There's a lot of national issues that are washing over and may wash out what would otherwise be local issues, driving some of these elections,” said Grant Reeher, a senior research associate at the Campbell Public Affairs Institute and a professor of political science at Syracuse University.
“There are a lot of known unknowns in this.”