Senator Susan Collins’ campaign opponents are criticized her for defending the Trump administration’s distribution of a federal stockpile of personal protective equipment (PPE) amid a nationwide shortage.
Earlier this month, Collins claimed that PPE was being disseminated to states on a per-capita basis. However, an analysis by the Portland Press Herald published on Wednesday found that distribution of N95 respirator masks and other protective gear from the Strategic National Stockpile last month was based on neither the population of each state nor the spread of the virus.
“The allocations appear arbitrary, and the Trump administration refused to provide an explanation for how they were made,” reported Press Herald staff writer Colin Woodard.
Receiving just 21 percent of the respirator masks requested, Maine, like many states, got only a fraction of what they require. Other states, like Florida, got everything they requested.
In an interview with the Bangor Daily News published on April 2, Collins suggested there was a rationale behind the Trump administration’s distribution of protective materials.
“The fact is that Maine requested far more masks than Florida did,” Collins said. “That is one mask for every 15 Mainers. In Florida, the number of masks is 540,000, but that equates to only one out of every 40 [Floridians] receiving or having masks. So the masks are generally allocated on a per-capita basis.”
Maine received 86,008 masks from that shipment — one mask for every 15.6 people in the state.
But large states like California, Florida and Texas received far less, per capita, than some smaller states, according to the Press Herald’s analysis. For example, Vermont, which listed 823 known cases of COVID-19 on Thursday, received one N95 mask for every 4.7 of its citizens, while Massachusetts, listing 42,944 known cases, received one for every 28 people.
In a virtual town hall with her supporters on Wednesday, Maine House Speaker Sara Gideon, one of Collins’ Democratic challengers, said, “There is simply no excuse for the lack of PPE, but there is a reason for it. The reason is that the federal government and the Trump administration has not taken on the responsibility and the leadership role that they must in order to ensure that, number one, PPE is produced in adequate quantities to be spread around this country and to every state, and number two, to make sure that that supply chain is coordinated.”
Maine CDC: Hoping on the federal government is not a strategy
Maine CDC director Dr. Nirav Shah said that when his agency received the shipment of PPE earlier this month from the stockpile, they were told by the federal government that it would be the last. On Wednesday, he said his agency has received an additional shipment of 145,000 masks. Shah added, however, that the state could not depend on the federal government for more surprise deliveries.
“We’re hoping that additional PPE remains and continues to be forthcoming from the federal government,” Shah said during his daily press briefing, “but hoping on the federal government to deliver N95s is not a strategy, so we are continuing our own procurement of PPE from private-sector vendors as well as other sources.”
On Tuesday, members of the Maine State Nurses Association, the state’s largest nurses union, teleconferenced with Collins and independent Senator Angus King. In addition to requesting the senators call on OSHA to enact an emergency temporary infectious diseases standard, the union asked them to mandate President Donald Trump fully utilize the Defense Production Act to direct U.S. manufacturers to massively scale up production of PPE.
On March 22, the New York Times reported that the Trump administration has been persuaded by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, a major national corporate lobby, to resist employing the Act.
The nurses union told Beacon that King agreed with all of their requests, while Collins committed to nothing.
“It’s inexcusable for Senator Collins to side with Trump over the people of Maine,” Betsy Sweet, another Democrat vying to unseat Collins, said in a statement.
Sweet said that if she is elected “I will fight like hell to make sure Maine gets the federal resources and support we need — whether it’s medical and testing supplies or transportation funding.”
Independent candidate Lisa Savage said, “It’s merely a continuation of her growing and seemingly endless track record of prioritizing wealthy donors, corporations, and, yes, the Trump Administration over the people of Maine. I might think that this time, when our frontline health care workers are literally risking their lives and crying out for federal support, Senator Collins would prioritize Mainers over the White House, but only if I hadn’t been paying attention for the last three years and beyond.”
The Press Herald asked Collins’ spokesperson, Annie Clark, if the senator was concerned that PPE wasn’t distributed on a per capita basis as she described, a question she didn’t answer, “instead providing a written statement documenting efforts Collins has made to secure additional PPE for Maine.”
“When the Press Herald asked Senator Collins a direct question about whether she even cares that we didn’t get the supplies we need to keep our people safe, she pivoted to campaigning,” said Democrat challenger Bre Kidman. “The endless political smokescreens and meaningless fluff pieces are exhausting — especially when we also have to listen to how much money they’re [Collins and Democratic frontrunner Gideon] spending on campaign ads and donor lists when many Mainers don’t know how we’re going to pay for our basic living expenses in the weeks to come.”
Top photo: video still from the Bangor Daily News stream of Sen. Susan Collins’ March 13 press conference about the COVID-19 pandemic.
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