Sen. Collins to endorse LePage as he launches campaign for governor

Sep. 22—U.S. Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, will endorse former Republican Gov. Paul LePage Wednesday in a pre-recorded video as LePage kicks off his campaign to challenge Democratic Gov. Janet Mills in 2022.

Collins, who is serving her fifth consecutive term in the Senate, won reelection in 2020 with 51 percent of vote.

"As Maine recovers from the pandemic, Paul is the best candidate to grow our economy," Collins says in the minute long video, which was released exclusively to the Press Herald on Wednesday afternoon.

"Paul and I believe that Maine's small businesses our the backbone of our economy," Collins says. "We must support our job creators and Maine's hard-working families. Paul is a job creator, that's his background, he's done it before and he will do it again."

She and LePage have not always seen eye-to-eye. LePage once said her decision to join with the late Sen. John McCain, R-Arizona, in 2016 to help Democrats defeat a Republican bill that would have undone most of the reforms in the Affordable Care Act, "really cooked her goose." LePage also told WGAN radio host Matthew Gagnon that Collins, was, "done in Maine."

But LePage eventually came to Collins' side, endorsing her in her 2020 reelection campaign against challenger Sara Gideon, a Freeport Democrat and former Speaker of the Maine House of Representatives.

The two have also held competing views on a variety of issues, including support for former Republican President Donald Trump. Collins openly criticized Trump in a letter to the Washington Post in 2016 saying she wouldn't be voting for him for president that year. LePage, meanwhile, stumped for Trump in Maine, appearing with him at four of his five campaign stops in the state that year.

This story will be updated.