Opinion

MORNING GLORY: Senator Susan Collins and the nation’s national defense

Collins and a handful of senior GOP senators have to break with regular order to protect the United States

By Hugh Hewitt Fox News

Published June 30, 2026 5:00am EDT

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Sen Susan Collins: Graham Platner is the 'antithesis' of the leadership I have provided

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Extraordinarily gifted legislators in the United States Senate are rare. As preconditions to their effectiveness, they must accumulate both significant seniority in the body of 100, and the respect of their ever-changing 99 colleagues. It’s a small club — the United States Senate — and everyone knows who has got the ability and the respect to guide big lifts through the (intentionally) complicated process.

Maine Senator Susan Collins is one of the handful of senators who command the respect of her Republican Conference colleagues and most of the Democratic senators who actually care about making the country run well. That is why Collins is the chair of the powerful Senate Appropriations Committee and is also one of the 17 senators on the critical Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. (Collins is also a member of the Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions.)

As chair of the Appropriations Committee, Collins has a unique power to guide the country’s spending. In partnership with the Chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee (SASC) Senator Roger Wicker (R-MS), Collins’ greatest responsibility as a legislator is to ensure the American military is fully funded to the level necessary to "provide for the common defense," as the Preamble of the Constitution succinctly puts it.

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Collins long ago earned a reputation as a Senate "workhorse," and her 10,000th consecutive Senate roll call vote — extending the unbroken voting streak she began in 1997 — made her the first senator in U.S. history to have cast this many votes without ever missing one. Even as Joe DiMaggio’s 1941 run of hits in 56 consecutive games is regarded as untouchable, so is Collins’ remarkable milestone (which towers higher with every roll call vote she makes.)

All of that experience and all of that earned respect will be needed in the weeks and months immediately ahead as Collins, along with Wicker and the Senate GOP........

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