Maine
U.S. Senate
Incumbent on the ballot
Forecast as of October 7, 2026. These vote totals equal the sum of the counties below. Not a poll average.
DTroy Jackson, DTroy Jackson
Democratic
RSusan Collins, RSusan Collins
Republican · Incumbent
Other
Margin
D+0.7
Win probability
56.0%
80% interval
D+6.8 to R+5.3
95% interval
D+10.1 to R+8.6
Market
57%
Troy Jackson · win probability, not a vote shareRaw data Checking polls.
50,000 draws. The 80% interval is the 10th to the 90th percentile. The 95% interval is the 2.5th to the 97.5th. The thin mark is the 95% interval. The thick mark is the 80%. The hairline is zero. 630,654 ballots, equal to the table.
Counties
Every reporting unit in the race. Sort any column. The votes above are this table added up.
| Party | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cumberland County | Troy Jackson | D | D+17.8 | 57.8% | 159,380 |
| York County | Troy Jackson | D | D+0.9 | 49.4% | 106,270 |
| Penobscot County | Susan Collins | R | R+12.5 | 55.2% | 69,658 |
| Kennebec County | Susan Collins | R | R+5.7 | 51.8% | 58,309 |
| Androscoggin County | Susan Collins | R | R+7.9 | 52.9% | 47,078 |
| Hancock County | Troy Jackson | D | D+3.1 | 50.5% | 29,001 |
| Aroostook County | Susan Collins | R | R+15.4 | 56.6% | 28,522 |
| Oxford County | Susan Collins | R | R+8.9 | 53.4% | 22,138 |
| Somerset County | Susan Collins | R | R+18.1 | 58.0% | 18,202 |
| Knox County | Troy Jackson | D | D+9.7 | 53.8% | 16,572 |
| Waldo County | Susan Collins | R | R+0.2 | 49.0% | 16,083 |
| Sagadahoc County | Troy Jackson | D | D+7.9 | 52.9% | 15,652 |
| Lincoln County | Troy Jackson | D | D+4.3 | 51.1% | 15,362 |
| Washington County | Susan Collins | R | R+17.8 | 57.8% | 11,551 |
| Franklin County | Susan Collins | R | R+4.0 | 50.9% | 10,345 |
| Piscataquis County | Susan Collins | R | R+20.5 | 59.2% | 6,531 |
Model
- Raw data
2024 presidential baseline
National R−D 1.5County presidential file. Not the 2026 result.
- Raw data
Generic ballot
D 50.8 R 42.6 R−D -8.2National Wikipedia aggregate, October 5, 2026. State generic ballots, where a public poll exists, replace a uniform national swing: ME, MI, NH, NY, OH. A state with no generic-ballot poll keeps the national number and is not assigned a neighbor's.
- Raw data
Party identification
Pew D+5 and Gallup D+10, blend R−D -7.3Pew NPORS 2026, identifiers plus leaners: Republican 43, Democratic 48. Gallup party identification plus leaners, first two quarters of 2026: Democratic 49, Republican 39. Pew is 55% of this blend and Gallup is 45%.
- Model input
National block
R−D -7.860% generic ballot and 40% party identification. The swing versus the 2024 presidential margin is what gets transmitted.
- Model input
Swing transmitted
0.40 × -9.3 = -3.7Only the share of the national swing this state took in the last midterm is transmitted. Elasticity is shrunk halfway toward 1.
- Raw data
2026 early vote
17,963 reported cast17,963 ballots reported cast as of 10/6/2026: 17,963 mail returned and 0 in person. Day-1 early vote is a signal, not a statewide margin. Mail is a count of returns, not the 2024 mail share. Applications and ballots that were only sent are not in this count. A day-1 pace gap is not a statewide margin.
- Model input
History block
R−D 4.2Weights 2018 40 / 2024 35 / 2020 20 / 2022 5. 2020 and 2022 results for this office are included in every state that had those races, including blowouts. A 2022 election is weighted ahead of 2018. If that office was not on the ballot, the 2020 result for the same office fills the year. Another office is not used. 2018 R+32.2 w40, 2024 D+17.0 w35, 2020 R+21.6 w20, 2022 from 2020 R+21.6 w5. This is the last result for the office, not the presidential margin. A 2024 county map is not copied forward unchanged. A 2018 model error is not used.
- Model input
Electorate block
R−D 0.7History reweighted by usual midterm turnout, plus half of the transmitted swing. Rural and presidential-only counties still move farther when the result is spread back to counties. The 2026 early-vote count is not inside this margin.
- Model input
Turnout block
R−D 1.9Each county is weighted by its 2018 ballots divided by its 2024 presidential ballots. Small counties shrink halfway toward the state median. 2020 mail shares are not used. 17,963 ballots reported cast as of 10/6/2026: 17,963 mail returned and 0 in person. Day-1 early vote is a signal, not a statewide margin. Mail is a count of returns, not the 2024 mail share.
- Model input
National environment
R−D -0.4History plus the full transmitted swing from the 60/40 national block.
- Model input
State environment
R−D 0.9History plus 45% of the transmitted swing.
- Model input
State partisan lean
R−D -6.9The 2024 presidential margin of this state, or of this district for a House race. It is heavier than the old state-environment block and is not shrunk toward the polling term.
- Model input
Trump popularity
R−D -11.3New York Times approval average, October 7, 2026: 37% approve, 60% disapprove. Net approval -23. That is not a vote share. Four-tenths of the net is a margin, then scaled by this place's partisan lean (factor 1.23), so an unpopular president costs more in a Democratic state.
- Model input
Candidate favorability
R−D 3.9Susan Collins's record minus this place's partisan lean is R+11.1. Thirty-five percent of that gap, capped at 5, is the favorability term, R+3.9. The old margin is not reused.
- Model input
Demographics
R−D -0.7County college, rural, and nonwhite shares from the 2018 election-context file change how much of the swing a county takes. No separate microdata file.
- Model input
Finance
R−D 2.0No sourced spending edge, so the block starts on history. With a poll, it shrinks toward the polling term with the other non-poll blocks.
- Model input
Issues
R−D 2.0No sourced issue score. Same treatment as finance.
- Model input
Polling
R−D -2.1Individual polls -2.2 (80%) and the Wikipedia average -1.5 (20%). Named support R−D -2. Allocated support R−D -2.1. Named support does not move. Only the undecided line is split, 48.2% Republican and 51.8% Democratic. That is the 2024 two-party Republican share 46.5 moved halfway to 50 and capped at 60/40. A named third-party vote stays third-party. Banned individual rows excluded: 2. State miss shrunk 40% toward zero: 0.00. Public pollsters: 11. Outliers: 0. Recency half-life 16 days. Sample weight n/(n+350). A registered-voter poll is 0.90. An internal poll, or a poll sponsored by one party, is weighted 0.20, and only when a public poll is also in the race. An internal-only file is dropped. A poll that names both parties is not an internal. A poll more than 8 points from the median of the others is cut in half.
- Model input
Candidate
R+1.50 reaches the resultSusan Collins keeps the incumbent term of 1.5 after shrinkage. Overperformance is a separate term and is not added again here. Susan Collins's 2020 race is already in the history block, so it is not applied again.
- Model input
Halfway floor
Not appliedNot applied. At least three public polls from different pollsters, and none is an outlier.
- Model input
Pooling
35% of the way from each history block toward the polling termOtherwise the shrink is 35%.
- Model input
Prediction market
57% win probabilityTroy Jackson 57.3% is a win probability, not a vote share. Republican win probability 42.8 from Kalshi 43.0% Republican; Polymarket 42.5% Republican. A price of 50 is a tie. Each point above 50 is 0.35 margin points, capped at 12, so the raw margin is -2.5. That margin is shrunk 40% toward the pre-market margin -0.7, which leaves -1.8. It enters once, at 5.0%. The polling term is not nudged. Books under $10,000 and primary markets are ignored.
- Model input
State bend
NoneNot applied.
- Model input
Weights
polling 20.4% · history 7.4% · candidate 5.6% · electorate 4.7% · national 5.6% · stateEnv 3.7% · turnout 2.8% · demographics 2.8% · finance 1.9% · issues 1.9% · stateLean 16.8% · trump 11.2% · favorability 10.3% · market 5.0%History is lighter. State partisan lean, Trump popularity, and candidate favorability are their own terms. A market, when it qualifies, scales every other weight and is not taken out of polling alone.
County-sum margin
-0.7This is the sum of the reporting units after each unit moved off its own history. It is not the poll average.
80% interval
-6.8 to 5.310th to 90th percentile of 50,000 draws. Poll, national, state, turnout, and candidate error.
95% interval
-10.1 to 8.62.5th to 97.5th percentile. Senate and governor state errors in the same state share a correlation of 0.30. The band shown is the marginal interval.
Wikipedia, 2026 United States Senate elections (general-election infobox, checked against the state narrative) www.bangordailynews.com/2026/02/10/opinion/opinion-contributor/susan-collins-reelection-experience-independence-matter/