MADAWASKA, Maine — U.S. Sen. Susan Collins will take her reelection campaign deep into northern Maine on Sunday, walking in Madawaska’s 48th annual Acadian Festival Parade as her “All of Maine” bus tour reaches the St. John Valley, the political backyard of Democratic challenger Troy Jackson.
Collins’ campaign announced Saturday that the Republican senator will participate in the parade beginning at 12:30 p.m. Sunday, Aug. 16. The parade is scheduled to begin at NorState Federal Credit Union and conclude at the corner of Sixth Avenue and Main Street.
The appearance provides a high-profile northern Maine conclusion to the opening weekend of Collins’ statewide bus tour, which began Friday at the Kittery Trading Post, nearly 350 miles south of Madawaska.
The Madawaska Acadian Festival runs Aug. 13 through Aug. 16 and is celebrating its 48th year. The annual gathering celebrates the St. John Valley’s Acadian heritage with music, food, cultural activities and a parade.
Collins’ arrival in Madawaska is particularly notable given the geography of this year’s U.S. Senate race.
Her Democratic opponent, former Maine Senate President Troy Jackson, built his political career in the St. John Valley and is closely identified with Allagash, roughly 40 miles west of Madawaska.
The Collins campaign launched its bus tour Friday in Kittery with plans to travel north through Maine before reaching Madawaska on Sunday. The campaign says the tour will eventually travel through all 16 counties and continue through Election Day.
For Collins, who grew up in Caribou and has represented Maine in the Senate since 1997, Sunday’s appearance also puts her back on familiar ground in Aroostook County.
But the visit comes at a particularly volatile moment in what is becoming one of the country’s most closely watched Senate contests.
Collins and Jackson Locked in Tight Race
Collins, a five-term Republican seeking a sixth term, is facing Jackson after an extraordinary shakeup on the Democratic side of the race.
Jackson became the Democratic nominee in July after Graham Platner withdrew from the contest amid allegations of sexual misconduct and assault, which Platner denied. Maine Democrats subsequently selected Jackson at a replacement convention in Bangor.
The race has remained remarkably close despite the upheaval.
A Fox News poll released Wednesday found Jackson receiving 48 percent support to Collins’ 46 percent. The two-point difference falls within the poll’s margin of sampling error, making the race statistically tied.
The contest is also drawing significant national attention because Maine could play an important role in determining control of the U.S. Senate.
But just as Jackson attempts to consolidate Democratic support following Platner’s departure, questions about his own past have increasingly become part of the campaign.
Decades-Old Police Report Surfaces
The Bangor Daily News reported Wednesday that a 1988 Fort Kent police report documented an incident involving Jackson, then 19, his longtime partner Lana Pelletier and another man.
According to the police report obtained by the newspaper, Jackson broke down a door and punched a man whom he believed was romantically involved with Pelletier. The matter resulted in a misdemeanor charge and was ultimately resolved with a fine.
More politically damaging is what the report says Pelletier told police afterward.
According to the report, Pelletier told an officer Jackson had “pushed her around” and that she intended to seek paperwork to stop him from harassing her.
Nearly four decades later, both Jackson and Pelletier dispute that account.
Jackson has denied ever being violent toward Pelletier, while Pelletier said she does not remember making the statement attributed to her in the police report and denied that Jackson pushed her. No record has surfaced showing that Pelletier followed through on seeking the cease-harassment paperwork mentioned in the report.
Jackson has acknowledged assaulting the man in the 1988 confrontation and has said he takes responsibility for that incident.
The allegations involving Pelletier have nevertheless become an issue in the Senate campaign, particularly as other accounts concerning Jackson’s temper and treatment of his longtime partner have surfaced.
The Maine Wire recently reported an allegation from a northern Maine resident who said he personally witnessed Jackson strike Pelletier during a separate incident years ago. Jackson has denied ever abusing Pelletier.
The competing accounts have created an important distinction: the 1988 police report documents Pelletier’s alleged statement to an officer, while more recent claims concerning other incidents are allegations from witnesses and have not resulted in criminal findings against Jackson.
Collins addressed the broader controversy during the launch of her bus tour Friday, telling reporters that Jackson has a reputation for struggling to control his temper, while stopping short of declaring the allegations against him proven.
Jackson and Pelletier Are Second Cousins
Jackson’s relationship with Pelletier had already attracted scrutiny before the 1988 police report surfaced.
The Maine Wire reported in July that Jackson and Pelletier, his longtime partner and the mother of his two adult sons, are second cousins.
Genealogical records reviewed by The Maine Wire traced both Jackson and Pelletier to the same great-grandparents, Thomas Pelletier and Edith Thibodeau. Their daughter Albertine was Jackson’s grandmother, while their son Louis Sr. was Pelletier’s grandfather, making Jackson and Pelletier second cousins.
The relationship has subsequently been reported by other national news organizations.
Jackson and Pelletier have been together for roughly four decades and have two adult children. They are not legally married, according to previous reporting.
Being second cousins is not illegal in Maine, and the family relationship itself has no bearing on the allegations contained in the 1988 police report. But the unusual family connection has added another layer of national attention to Jackson’s personal history during an already unconventional Senate campaign.
Collins Takes Campaign into Jackson Country
Sunday’s parade therefore carries considerably more political significance than an ordinary campaign appearance.
Madawaska sits at the heart of the St. John Valley, where Jackson has cultivated his political identity as a logger and working-class northern Maine Democrat.
Collins, meanwhile, is an Aroostook County native herself.
Her decision to conclude the first weekend of her statewide tour in the region sends the incumbent Republican directly into territory where Jackson will likely need a strong performance in November.
The symbolism of the opening trip is difficult to miss.
Collins began Friday near Maine’s southern border in Kittery. By Sunday afternoon, she will be walking through Madawaska, one of the northernmost communities in the state and just miles from the Canadian border.
The trip allows Collins to reinforce one of the central messages of her reelection campaign: that despite serving nearly three decades in Washington, she intends to campaign personally in communities from one end of Maine to the other.
And this weekend, the northern end of that journey happens to be in Troy Jackson’s backyard.
The 48th annual Acadian Festival Parade begins Sunday at 12:30 p.m. at NorState Federal Credit Union in Madawaska and will finish at Sixth Avenue and Main Street.
