Vance defends Canada trade war in visit to Maine; Collins skips rally

Susan Collins had a "scheduling conflict." Sure. Maine shares a border and a lobster industry with Canada, and its senior senator couldn't find twenty minutes to stand next to the vice president while he defends a trade war that's already spooking her constituents. That's not a calendar problem. That's a senator doing the math on who she has to answer to in Bangor versus who she has to answer to in Washington, and picking Bangor.

Vance's job in Brewer was to sell a policy that looks a lot cleaner on a whiteboard in DC than it does at a dock in Eastport. Tariffs on Canada are supposed to be leverage, a way to force better terms on trade and border security. Fine in theory. But Maine's economy is stitched into Canada's in ways that don't care about theory: seafood processors, paper mills, cross-border trucking, tourism that runs both directions. When the vice president says the pain is worth it, he's asking a state that didn't vote for this fight to eat the cost of it.

Collins isn't some squishy dissenter looking for a headline. She's the Republican with the most direct exposure to what this trade war actually does to real businesses, and she's saying so out loud while most of the party stays quiet. That ought to count for something instead of being treated as disloyalty. A party that can't tolerate one senator skipping a rally over a policy that's hurting her own state isn't disciplined. It's just not listening.

None of this means the underlying argument for tougher trade terms with Canada is wrong. It might be worth the squeeze. But you don't get to claim that case is settled while the senator who represents the people paying for it walks the other way. Vance can give speeches. Collins has to answer constituents. Guess which one tells you more about how this is actually landing.