In the recent fight over the appoint of Judge Kavanaugh to the U.S. Supreme Court one group is liberals tried to incentive Senator Susan Collins of Maine to defect from her party, the Republicans, and vote against the judge’s confirmation. To do this that started a crow-funded campaign to raise money for her yet unknown 2020 general election campaign opponent. Their statement was simple vote yes and the money raised would be donated to the unknown Democratic politician, vote no and the people would never be charged for their contribution and the money would never materialize. Collins votes yes and to date I think they have passed the 3 million dollar mark in their fund raising, but in my opinion their attempt was doomed before it began.

Certainly Collins needs to fight and win her general election campaign to keep her spot in the U.S. Senate but before she faces the public in a general election she’ll face her party in a primary election and if she fell there and hazards for the general are instantly meaningless and that is the crux of the reason why this threat was always empty and impotent.

Maine, along with the rest of the GOP, has been becoming more conservative including electing LePage, a Tea party type of Republican, to the governorship. If Collins had voted no on Kavanaugh she would have certainly attracted a primary challenge and already hobbled by a moderate pro-choice position in this increasingly conservative party she would have very likely not survived the primary to go on to the general election so any pressure focused on the general is pointless. Collins was never going to be bowed by a general election threat when taking an action to avoid it cost her the primary election.

Setting aside the issue if the scheme violated any of the incredibly complex campaign finance laws this was never going to succeed and for Collins is may have been meaningless to agonize over this vote. Taking a position to confirm Kavanaugh is no way assures her survival in 2020’s primary, her pro-choice stance along with a smattering of other moderate position already invites a challenge as the party move closer to becoming a reflection of its leader Trump she becomes a progressively poor fit.