Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, had a sly way of addressing reports that Troy Jackson, her Democratic opponent, fathered two children with his second cousin.
"Well, I'm not going to bring up the fact that the mother of his two children is his second cousin," Collins told a Politico reporter when asked if Jackson’s personal life would be fair game on the campaign trail. "I don’t know whether people know that or not."
"But you just mentioned it," the reporter shot back.
The clip quickly spread across social media as conservatives praised Collins for her political savvy.
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Republican political operative Jesse Hunt reacted to a clip of the interview by calling Collins a "silent killer."
"A less-than-2-minute precis of how Susan Collins is as stone-cold a political combatant as the Senate has ever seen," Politico editor Mike DeBonis wrote on X.
National Rifle Association public affairs director and Maine native Justin Davis responded to the clip by predicting that "the upcoming debates are going to be gold." NOTUS reporter Igor Bobic, meanwhile, said that Collins used a "Trump tactic" by bringing up a subject while pretending not to mention it.
"Count Collins out (like everyone did in ‘20) at your own peril," Targeted Victory CCO Matt Gorman posted on X.
"Susan Collins from the top rope on Troy Jackson," GOP communicator Steve Guest posted on X.
Reports about Jackson’s relationship with his second cousin first surfaced in July, when The Maine Wire reported that Jackson and his longtime partner share the same great-grandparents.
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"It's truly hysterical how Democrats can't seem to find one normal dude to run for office," conservative commentator Greg Price posted on X, alluding to the fact that Jackson replaced Graham Platner on the ballot in Maine after he terminated his campaign amid a rape allegation.
Other aspects of Jackson’s personal life have come to the forefront of his Senate campaign, including a 1988 police report which claims he assaulted a man at a bar. The report also states that his partner accused him of pushing her around.
Jackson does not dispute that he attacked another man, but strongly denies laying a hand on his partner, who has said she does not recall giving a statement to that effect to the police.
When asked about the police report in August, Collins told Fox News Digital that "he’s the one that needs to respond to the reports. I’m not going to comment on them. But I will say that based on widespread reporting it appears that he struggles to control his temper ... From my perspective, it seems that vetting is very important. We learned the failure of vetting with Graham Platner. But that’s really up to the Democrats."
During her interview with Politico, Collins denied that Jackson would necessarily be an easier opponent than Platner, pointing out that the former has a long political record that he can be criticized over — something that Platner lacked as a political outsider.
Jackson has framed the GOP focus on his personal life as a distraction from the issues Mainers actually care about.
"Susan Collins will do anything to distract from the fact that she votes with Trump 96% of the time and has sold out working people in Maine," his campaign previously told Fox News Digital. "Personal attacks on Troy's family are shameful and desperate."
The Jackson campaign did not respond to a request for comment when reached by Fox News Digital on Wednesday.
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