Mere minutes.

That’s how long it took for Sen. Susan Collins to take action and call authorities after she first saw a message that abortion rights activists chalked on the sidewalk outside her home in Bangor in May 2022; the message asked the senator to support the Women’s Health Protection Act in an upcoming vote.

The police report that was filed described the messages as “intricately drawn” and non-threatening. Authorities also stated that, although the chalked message did not constitute a crime, they did comply with the senator’s request to call the local public works department and have the message removed — a move that infringed upon the First Amendment rights of the protesters.

In a statement given days later, Collins stated that she was “grateful to the Bangor police officers and the city public works employee who responded to the defacement of public property in front of [her] home.”

Seven days and counting.

The American people are still waiting for Collins to take action after employees of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) were locked out of their offices and computer systems on Monday, Feb. 3. Later that day, Sen. Collins issued a statement of “concern” regarding the incident at USAID where Elon Musk said Trump had agreed to let Musk close the agency.

On the following day, Feb. 4, a group of 37 senators wrote a letter to Secretary of State Marco Rubio, demanding answers for what had transpired with USAID, describing the actions of the Trump administration as “illegal” and “without regard to relevant appropriations laws.” While Maine’s own Angus King was one of the 37 senators who signed the letter, the signature of Susan Collins, who serves as the chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, was notably absent.

Three years ago, activists were exercising their First Amendment rights in a polite, legal, non-threatening way when Collins responded swiftly by calling the police and having the message, which she described as “defacement,” removed.

Since the start of his presidential term, Trump and his administration have made unlawful orders that both disregard the language of our Constitution and stand in complete defiance of the authority of the very committee Sen. Collins chairs. Where other senators have taken action, Collins has merely issued statements.

It makes me wonder, if USAID workers had walked into work on Feb. 3 and found messages outside written in chalk would we have seen Collins take decisive action? Are we to believe that Collins considers polite, impassioned pleas written in chalk to be more threatening than the dismantling of essential government services?

One year. That’s how long it is until Sen. Collins plans to seek reelection. I hope that voters remember the “threats” that Collins chose to act on upon during her most recent term and the vast number for which she simply “expressed concern.”

Mainers deserve a senator who is going to act in their best interests, not against them. Do we want a senator who uses her power to silence us while also eschewing her responsibilities to the American people as the executive branch ransacks our institutions? If Susan Collins isn’t going to take appropriate action, then we as voters need to step up and take action to vote her out in 2026.