‘Oh Shut Up’: Troy Jackson Snaps at Susan Collins When She Blames Him for Protester

Maine Democratic U.S. Senate nominee Troy Jackson snapped at Republican Sen. Susan Collins during Thursday’s debate after a protester interrupted the proceedings.

Jackson, a former Maine Senate president, became the Democratic nominee after previous nominee Graham Platner withdrew from the race following a rape allegation. Polls show a tight race, with the candidates within the margin of error of one another. Democrats are hoping to flip the seat, which Collins has held since 1997, en route to retaking the Senate, which Republicans control 53-47.

During the debate, the moderator asked the candidates to cite instances where they had bucked their party.

“Two issues,” Collins said, before being interrupted by a protester who began yelling.

“Senator Collins, I’m so sorry to interrupt,” the man said.

“Somebody’s interrupting,” the moderator noted. “We’ll have our security deal with that.”

“AI data centers are destroying our climate,” the protester continued. “They are poisoning our waters.”

Collins chimed in to blame Jackson for the outburst.

“So this is obviously one of Troy’s supporters,” the senator said.

“Oh shut up,” Jackson shot back. “I don’t even know that kid.”

Last week, Collins was also interrupted at Maine’s Fryeburg Fair, where a man heckled her as she made remarks to fair-goers.

“Hey, you can’t eat road salt, can you?!” a man shouted, referring to a rebuttal Jackson made in a previous debate. “You can’t eat road salt!”

As Collins pressed on, the man added, “Suck it! Woo!”

In that prior debate, Collins noted that she opposes President Donald Trump’s tariffs on Canada and said she successfully lobbied the president to grant tariff exemptions for concrete and road salt.

“I mean, we can’t eat road salt,” Jackson said. “And the thing about it is that everything that she is doing with the Iran war and stuff like that, there’s gonna be so many less people that are gonna be able to afford to drive that I’m not even sure the road salt is gonna be worth anything either.”

Watch above via CNN/WSCH.

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