Jackson, Collins tangle on Canada tariffs: 'We can't eat road salt'
The Hill · C · trust 58/100
Comments: by Julia Mueller - 10/07/26 4:36 PM ET Comments: Link copied by Julia Mueller - 10/07/26 4:36 PM ET Comments: Link copied NOW PLAYING Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Democrat Troy Jackson tangled over the Trump administration’s tariffs on Canada during the first debate of their battleground Senate race in Maine.
Collins stressed her opposition to the tariffs on Canada, hailing America’s longtime ally as a vital trading partner for the state she’s represented for five terms in the Senate.
“But I’ve also been working behind the scenes. Troy mocked it, but I was successful in getting concrete, pulp and road salt removed from the tariff list. And if you ask towns in northern Maine and eastern Maine, they get all of their road salt from Canada,” the senator said.
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She sent a letter in August to the administration on the “unfortunate breakdown in trade negotiations” between the U.S. and Canada that resulted in tariffs, and urged the administration to consider that “Maine’s economy is uniquely intertwined with Canada,” with a 611-mile shared border. The exemptions were announced in September .
“I didn’t mock the fact that she got road salt back. I mock the fact that: What about everything else? I mean, we can’t eat road salt,” Jackson hit back at the debate.
The Democrat argued that, in light of the Iran war and other factors driving up prices, “There’s going to be so many less people to be able to afford to drive that I’m not even sure the road salt’s going to be worth anything either.”
Democrats quickly seized on the exchange, with the party’s Senate campaign arm likening Collins’s comment to Marie Antoinette’s infamous “let them eat cake” line.
Republicans’ Senate campaign arm, on the other hand, cast blame for Maine’s economic struggles on Jackson’s 20-year tenure in the state Legislature.
The hourlong debate hosted by WGME-TV was the first of four scheduled faceoffs between Collins and Jackson as Election Day nears.
Jackson has been leading Collins by roughly a point in Decision Desk HQ’s polling averages of the race, and top forecasters rate the race as a critical toss-up in the fight for Senate control.
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