People Are Channeling Their Susan Collins Rage By Donating To Her Opponent
People have donated more than $2 million to Susan Collins’ future opponent
Two weeks ago, activist Ady Barkan partnered with Maine People’s Alliance to raise money for Susan Collins’ future opponent. The concept was pretty simple. If Collins voted against Brett Kavanaugh, the money raised would be returned to its donors. If she voted for Kavanaugh, it would go straight to the democrat who challenges Collins in 2020.
Well, we all know how that vote went. And in turn, the money poured in.
As the senator took to the podium and began her (very long-winded) explanation for why she was voting for Kavanaugh, more than $1 million was donated to Barkan’s campaign, according to CNN. So many people were visiting the page that the crowd funding site crashed. By the following morning, the amount had reached a staggering $2,955,442.
People were angry. Very, very angry. They took to Twitter to announce that they had donated to Collins’ future opponent and said that they were ready to fight hard for that 2020 seat. Also, a lot of people were complaining about the fact that the site had crashed and they wanted to make more donations (ahhh there is good left in the world).
https://twitter.com/jetpack/status/1048299628226138117
This robust fund could make a big difference in the upcoming election, especially for Democrats in Maine who didn’t think they had a chance of running against Collins.
“Nobody ever goes in that early, nobody is even thinking about, and what we’ve just done is set it up for a candidate to legitimately have a chance,” Liz Jaff, the executive director of Be A Hero PAC, tells CNN. “Starting capital for any person running for Senate in Maine hasn’t even been close to what we just raised. So I think what happens is suddenly you will have a bunch of people who say, ‘I could never have raised that money. It’s just going to be too tough,’ are suddenly looking at a pool of capital they could have access to.”
And democrats are already stepping up. Susan Rice, the former National Security Advisor for President Obama, tweeted the word “me,” when one Twitter user put out a call to action for someone to run against Collins.
Even though Rice later explained that she wasn’t officially throwing her hat in the ring, people really, really liked that idea.
It’s been a very hard few weeks. People working their butts off to get a politician in the Senate who doesn’t make excuses for someone accused of sexual assault is the small ray of sunshine we all need.
