PRESS RELEASE
National Security Experts Condemn Her Record Enabling Trump's Reckless Foreign Policy
PORTLAND, ME — Yesterday, 62 former U.S. ambassadors and national security leaders spanning across five decades and nominated by Democratic and Republican presidents endorsed Troy Jackson for U.S. Senate. In a letter announcing the endorsement, they pointed to Susan Collins’ record of voting with Trump 96% of the time, enabling his senseless war in Iran and failing to stop his trade war with Canada that’s increasing costs across the board for working Mainers.
See what they’re saying:
The Hill: Former diplomats, top foreign affairs experts back Jackson in Maine Senate race
Sixty-two officials — including former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice, former Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman, former Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Thomas Pickering and former Director General of Foreign Service W. Robert Pearson — signed a letter throwing their support behind the former Maine Senate president’s candidacy, which was released Monday and first shared with The Hill.
The letter, whose signatories span appointees from former President Carter to President Trump and many of whom Collins voted to confirm, rebuked the GOP senator over her voting record and laid blame with her for the war with Iran and the tariff war with Canada.
The letter criticized Collins for voting against multiple war powers resolutions aimed at reining in Trump’s ability to go to war with Iran and for voting “to confirm the officials charged with carrying out Trump’s tariff agenda despite their stated intentions.”
Maine's Total Coverage spoke with two members of the group who individually have decades of experience in foreign relations, and they say they've never been as concerned with the state of the nation as they are right now.
"We are at the most dangerous moment in U.S. history during my tenure, anyway, of working on all of these issues," stated former U.S. Ambassador to Algeria Craig Johnstone. "It is absolutely amazing how far we have fallen as a country. We have fallen way far. We were once the shining light on the hill. We are not the shining light on anybody's hill anymore."
"I am genuinely concerned about the direction of the country," said former U.S. Ambassador to Syria Robert Ford. "I have never been this concerned before. I have never been so concerned about respect for the rule of law inside our own country. I have never been as concerned about the deterioration of alliances, whether it be with Canada or with countries in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization."
They signed a letter attesting to Jackson’s “judgment” and say he will be a senator who’ll “defend the alliances” and “demand accountability” before agreeing to deploy American troops.
Signatories include former Obama National Security Adviser Susan Rice and Former Biden Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman.
About half of the people on the list worked in Republican presidential administrations -- Reagan, both Bushes, and Trump -- or for administrations of both parties, as if often the case with career foreign service professionals.
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