Susan Collins

Susan Margaret Collins (born December 7, 1952) is the senior United States Senator from Maine and a member of the Republican Party. First elected to the Senate in 1996, she is the ranking member of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs.

Early life
One of six children, Susan Collins was born in Caribou, Maine, where her family has operated a lumber business since 1844. Her parents, Patricia R. (née McGuigan) and Donald F. Collins, each served as mayor of Caribou; her father also served in both houses of the Maine Legislature. Her mother was born in Barranca-Bermeja, Colombia, to American parents. Her uncle, Samuel W. Collins, Jr., sat on the Maine Supreme Judicial Court from 1988 to 1994. Collins attended Caribou High School, where she was president of the student council. During her senior year of high school in 1971, Collins was chosen to participate in the U.S. Senate Youth Program, through which she visited Washington, D.C., for the first time and engaged in a two-hour conversation with U.S. Senator Margaret Chase Smith (R-ME). Collins is the first program delegate elected to the Senate and currently holds the seat once held by Smith.

After graduating from Caribou High School, she continued her education at St. Lawrence University in Canton, New York. Like her father before her, she was elected to the Phi Beta Kappa national academic honor society. She graduated from St. Lawrence magna cum laude with a bachelor's degree in government in 1975.

Early political career
Following graduation, Collins worked as a legislative assistant to U.S. Representative, and later U.S. Senator, William Cohen (R-ME) from 1975 to 1987. She was also staff director of the Oversight of Government Management Subcommittee on the United States Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs (1981–1987).

In 1987, Collins returned to Maine and joined the cabinet of Governor John R. McKernan, Jr., as Commissioner of the Department of Professional and Financial Regulation. She was appointed the New England regional director for the Small Business Administration by President George H. W. Bush in 1992. After briefly serving in this post until the 1992 election of Democrat Bill Clinton, she moved to Massachusetts and became Deputy State Treasurer of Massachusetts under Joe Malone in 1993.

Returning to Maine, Collins won an eight-way Republican primary in the 1994 gubernatorial election, becoming the first woman to be nominated by a major party for Governor of Maine. During the campaign, she received little support from Republican leaders and was criticized by conservative groups for her more liberal views on social issues. She lost the general election, receiving 23% of the vote and placing third behind Democrat Joseph E. Brennan and the winner, Independent candidate Angus King.

In December 1994, Collins became the founding executive director of the Center for Family Business at Husson College in Bangor. She served in this post until 1996, when she announced her candidacy for the seat in the U.S. Senate being vacated by her former boss, William Cohen, who retired to become U.S. Secretary of Defense under President Clinton. With Cohen's public endorsement, she won a difficult four-way primary and faced Joe Brennan, her Democratic opponent from the 1994 gubernatorial election, in the general election. She eventually defeated Brennan by a margin of 49% to 44%. She was reelected in 2002 over State Senator Chellie Pingree (D), 58%-42%, and again in 2008 over Rep. Tom Allen (D), 61.5%-38.5%. In both elections, she carried every county in Maine.

Senate career
Described as one of "the last survivors of a once common species of moderate Northeastern Republican," Collins is considered a bipartisan and centrist member of the Republican Party, and an influential player in the U.S. Senate. She is a member of several moderate organizations within the Republican Party, including the Republican Main Street Partnership, Republican Majority For Choice, Republicans for Choice, The Wish List, Republicans for Environmental Protection, and the Republican Leadership Council. Her voting record was at one time center-left which has caused some Republicans to label her as a "Republican in Name Only" (RINO). Although she shares a centrist ideology with Maine's senior Senator, Olympia Snowe, Collins is considered a "half-turn more conservative" than Snowe. Collins has consistently been endorsed by the Human Rights Campaign, a major LGBT rights organization; she was one of six Republicans that ran in 2008 to be endorsed by the HRC. She supported John McCain in the 2008 election for President of the United States.

Voting record
In the 1990s, Collins played an important role during the U.S. Senate's impeachment trial of Bill Clinton when she and fellow Maine Senator Olympia Snowe sponsored a motion that would have allowed the Senate to vote separately on the charges and the remedy. When the motion failed, both Snowe and Collins subsequently voted to acquit, believing that while Clinton had broken the law by committing perjury, the charges did not amount to grounds for removal from office.

Collins voted with the majority in favor of the Iraq War Resolution authorizing President George W. Bush to go to war against Iraq, on October 10, 2002.

On October 21, 2003, with Senate Democrats, Collins was one of the three Republican Senators to oppose the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act. She did however join the majority of Republicans in voting for Laci and Conner's Law to increase penalties for killing the unborn while committing a violent crime against the mother.

On May 23, 2005, Collins was one of fourteen senators to forge a compromise on the Democrats' use of the judicial filibuster, thus allowing the Republican leadership to end debate without having to exercise the so-called "nuclear option". Under the agreement the minority party would retain the power to filibuster a Presidential judicial nominee only in an "extraordinary circumstance", and three Bush appellate court nominees (Janice Rogers Brown, Priscilla Owen, and William Pryor) would receive a vote by the full Senate, while two others, Henry Saad and William Myers, were expressly denied such protection. Saad and Myers both eventually withdrew their names from consideration.

Collins voted against the restrictions on travel to Cuba, harsher punishments for drug users, and amending the U.S. Constitution to prohibit same-sex marriages. She has also joined the moderates in the Republican Party and a vast majority of Democrats in supporting campaign finance reform laws. In 2003 she was the only Republican to vote for limiting a tax cut in order to help rural hospitals.

Collins has voted against some free-trade agreements including the Dominican Republic – Central America Free Trade Agreement. In 1999 she was one of only four Republicans (along with her colleague Olympia Snowe) to vote for a Wellstone amendment to the Trade and Development Act of 2000 which would have conditioned trade benefits for Caribbean countries on "compliance with internationally recognized labor rights." This vote, joined only by Republicans Jim Jeffords and Arlen Specter, put her to the political left of many Democratic senators including 2008 presidential contenders John Edwards, Christopher Dodd, and Joseph Biden.

Collins coauthored, along with Senator Joe Lieberman, the Collins-Lieberman Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004. This law implemented many of the recommendations of the 9-11 Commission, modernizing and improving America's intelligence systems.

In October 2006, President George W. Bush signed into law major port security legislation coauthored by Collins and Washington Senator Patty Murray. The new law includes major provisions to significantly strengthen security at U.S. ports.

Collins voted in favor of and for the extension of the Bush tax cuts. She offered an amendment to the original bill that allowed for tax credits to school teachers who purchase classroom materials.

Collins voted for the confirmation of two U.S. Supreme Court Justice nominees, Samuel Alito and John G. Roberts. In July 2009, Collins announced her intention to vote for the confirmation of President Barack Obama's first U.S. Supreme Court nominee, U.S. Court of Appeals Judge Sonia Sotomayor, breaking from the opposition led by several conservative Republican senators.

On September 19, 2007, she voted against a motion to invoke cloture on Senator Arlen Specter's amendment proposing to restore habeas corpus for those detained by the United States.

Collins, joining the Senate majority, voted in favor of the Protect America Act, an amendment to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978. Additionally, she voted to deny congressional oversight of Central Intelligence Agency spying programs.

Siding with the majority, Collins voted for the Military Commissions Act of 2006 that stripped the right to a writ of habeas corpus and access to a lawyer for prisoners held of charges of terrorism by the U.S. government. She voted against an amendment to the bill that would have allowed defendants the right to habeas corpus.

In 2004, along a mainly party-line vote, Collins voted against an amendment to prohibit "profiteering and fraud relating to military action, relief, and reconstruction." She later sponsored the Accountability in Government Contracting Act of 2007, approved unanimously by the Senate, which would create more competition between military contractors.

Agreeing with the majority in both parties, Collins voted in favor of the Kyl-Lieberman Amendment, which gave President Bush and the executive branch the authorization for military force against Iran.

As ranking member of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, Collins and committee chairman Senator Joe Lieberman voiced concerns about budget, outside contractors, privacy and civil liberties relating to the National Cyber Security Center, the Comprehensive National Cybersecurity Initiative and United States Department of Homeland Security plans to enhance Einstein, the program which protects federal networks. Citing improved security and the benefits of information sharing, as of mid-2008, Collins was satisfied with the response the committee received from Secretary Michael Chertoff.

In September 2008, Collins joined the Gang of 20, a bipartisan group seeking a comprehensive energy reform bill. The group is pushing for a bill that would encourage state-by-state decisions on offshore drilling and authorize billions of dollars for conservation and alternative energy.

Ultimately, Collins was one of just three Republican lawmakers to vote for the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, earning heated criticism from the right for crossing party lines on the bill. In mid-December 2009, Collins was again one of three Republican senators to back a $1.1 trillion appropriations bill for the fiscal year beginning in 2010, joining Thad Cochran of Mississippi and Kit Bond of Missouri in compensating for three Democratic "nay" votes to pass the bill over a threatened GOP filibuster.

On January 29, 2009, Collins voted in favor of the Children's Health Insurance Program Reauthorization Act (H.R. 2).

Collins opposed President Barack Obama's health reform legislation; she voted against the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act in December 2009, and she voted against the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010.

The Cantwell-Collins bill (S. 2877), also called the Carbon Limits and Energy for America's Renewal (CLEAR) Act, directs the Secretary of the Treasury to establish a program to regulate the entry of fossil carbon (fossil fuel) into commerce in the United States, to promote renewable energy jobs and economic growth. The bill is bipartisan with Maria Cantwell, a Democrat from Washington.

On December 18, 2010, Collins voted in favor of the Don't Ask, Don't Tell Repeal Act of 2010 and was the primary Republican sponsor of the repeal effort.

During the routine calling of names on the Senate floor on July 12, 2012, Senator Collins cast her 5,000th consecutive roll-call vote, marking a streak that put her in third place behind Sen. Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa) in second place and Sen. William Proxmire (D-Wis), who holds the number-one spot.

Committee appointments

 * United States Senate Committee on Appropriations
 * Subcommittee on Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies
 * Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government (Ranking Member)
 * Subcommittee on Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies
 * Subcommittee on Military Construction, Veterans Affairs, and Related Agencies
 * Subcommittee on Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, and Related Agencies
 * Committee on Armed Services
 * Subcommittee on Emerging Threats and Capabilities
 * Subcommittee on Personnel
 * Subcommittee on SeaPower
 * Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs (Ranking Member)
 * As Ranking Member of the full committee, Collins may serve as an ex officio member of all subcommittees.
 * Special Committee on Aging

Electoral history
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