It just ended: https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/watch-live-collins-jackson-face-off-in-maine-u-s-senate-debate

Their fourth and final debate tonight with PBS moderators

Sidenote: I thought it was odd when that Susan Collins was dumbfounded when asked to name a time she voted against her party when her vote actually mattered. She brought up the Hegseth vote where it *almost* mattered. The moderator pointed out that vote didn't matter. She said someone in the press counted 56 times once, but the fact that she couldn't think of one single example in her 30 years was striking.

Something I didn't really understand which happened in every single debate- Susan Collins was somehow touting her work on the OBBBA as a good thing, while also bragging about her vote against the final bill (as an example of her bucking the party)?

It keeps coming up because it cuts ~$1 trillion in Medicaid over 10 years. To over-simplify things for brevity, this hurts reimbursements and OBBBA is responsible for rural hospitals closing all around the country- including Maine. It's a nuanced issue, so for some context:

In the first debate, Troy Jackson said Collins voted to advance the OBBBA to the senate floor out of her committee. Jackson was wrong- he misspoke by saying she voted it out of her committee, and Collins noted and torched him for his mistake. It was a full Senate vote, for a motion to proceed on the OBBBA and to the floor to debate. It passed 51-49 with Collins voting to advance.

Collins has defended this vote for the OBBBA by saying "it would've passed anyway"- which could be true, as VP Vance could break if it was a 50/50 tie... but it's a cop-out answer. The initial draft had some truly dreadful shit in there (like.. literally no laws regulating AI for 10 years!), so it's very possible another Republican could've gotten a spine and voted down the package in its original form. Yes, after it passed, it was further amended to remove some of the truly terrible things, as well as add in the RHTF amendment, which Collins "championed"...

Collins touted the $50 billion Rural Health Transformation Fund in each debate, which she did help negotiate into the OBBBA (with Murkowski, Hawley, some others). This was inserted to help fund rural hospitals because they all realized that this bill will slowly eliminate rural hospitals/healthcare. Maine received $190 million this first year from the OBBBA/RHTF, which sounds great!

But this is a fraction of reimbursements vs what's being lost, and only a five year band-aid for a major ten year wound.
$ 1,000,000,000,000 is one trillion, being cut over 10 years (or $100 bil/year)

$ 50,000,000,000 is fifty billion, being restored/funded over 5 years ($10 bil/year)

The OBBBA also imposes several more costs like various stricter/more frequent verification rules, non-emergency medical transportation cuts, and this isn't even taking the Medicare sequestration into account which could literally be another 1/2 trillion itself! This is why Jackson compared her work to "an arsonist who helped set the fire, and then she wants credit for bringing a cup of water to put it out". Rural hospitals (that were already struggling) simply can't keep up with these changes the OBBBA imposes.

So Susan Collins wants credit for the RHTF amendment... that she ultimately voted against, because she doesn't want credit for the massive cuts that were in the bill that she voted for (to advance).

Can anyone explain the logic on how Collins could possibly see/tout the changes rural healthcare from the OBBBA as a good thing?