On March 11, I learned that I would not be returning to Bowdoin’s campus to finish the semester due to the COVID-19 pandemic. In the days since, I have been reminded constantly of the vast inequalities that exist in this country, and even within a student population of Bowdoin’s size.
I have friends who are unsure about how their families will handle the financial stress of the health crisis. Friends who were unable to afford a plane ticket home. Friends whose parents have to keep working and sacrifice their health.
These are symptoms of much larger structural issues within our country. Issues that Sen. Collins has largely come to ignore during her time in Washington.
When Sen. Collins followed Trump and McConnell’s lead and voted to give tax breaks to our country’s biggest corporations, who was she looking out for? When Sen. Collins voted repeatedly to repeal the Affordable Care Act (ACA), who was she looking out for? When Sen. Collins accepted campaign contributions from pharmaceutical giants like Eli Lilly, who was she looking out for? When she led the charge to cut critical funding for pandemic preparedness funding in 2009, who was she looking out for?
She certainly was not looking out for Mainers, or any of my classmates and their families who are now struggling to make ends meet and, even more fundamentally, to have the tools they need to handle this crisis.
Where was Sen. Collins’ leadership during attempts to pass universal paid sick leave for Americans? Or paid family and medical leave? Or to preserve and strengthen the ACA?
She was missing in action. And as a result, far too many are now dealing with the consequences. We need our representatives, especially Collins, to fight for policies that create structural change to reduce inequality rather than propping up the corporations that exacerbate it.
Jack Shane,
Los Angeles, California
Comments are not available on this story.
Send questions/comments to the editors.
