Here in Maine, we understand that climate change poses real risks. The costly damage to homes and businesses from floods last winter underscores that. We also know it’s in our best interest to seize commonsense solutions for our state, including building more clean energy and battery storage that can reduce our reliance on volatile heating oil prices.

That’s why it’s alarming that a Project 2025 author, who is hellbent on ousting science and public health experts and gutting clean energy investments, could take a powerful post in President Trump’s administration.

The U.S. Senate just held a hearing on the nomination of Russell Vought to lead the Office of Management and Budget. While the agency isn’t well known outside Washington, it’s been dubbed the “nerve center” of the government for its profound influence on how government serves the public. As someone who works to expand clean air, water and energy, and calls Maine home, I’m extremely concerned about his promises to dismantle safeguards and solutions that our communities depend on.

Sen. Susan Collins has expressed reservations over Vought because of the plans he wrote in Project 2025, a radical playbook to aggressively expand the powers of the president that even Trump sought to distance himself from.

She should trust that gut feeling and oppose his confirmation.

Vought wrote the Project 2025 chapter on how to centralize the president’s power, outlining how to fire scores of scientists and experts and replace them with political appointees who have no scientific expertise, so that no one is standing in the way of a reckless agenda that prioritizes polluters’ interests over people’s health. He has not been shy about his ire for dedicated public servants, saying those who work every day to keep our air and water clean should be villainized and experience so much “trauma” they don’t even want to go to work anymore.

Vought also wants to remove any consideration of “climate” from the government, as if that might erase the impacts people in Maine are already facing, such as excessive flooding or the high cost of home insurance. At the top of his list is weakening a core federal research program that helps cities and states plan for climate impacts. This is the same program that revealed how a disappearing ozone layer harmed Americans in the 1990s and led to practical solutions.

Beyond hollowing out scientific expertise that we rely on, it’s clear that Vought will use his power to gut investments in clean energy and grid resilience. Maine has the fastest growing clean energy workforce in New England, and we have a vested interest in building a cleaner, more reliable electric grid to meet our energy needs. Sen. Collins understands this reality and has made important strides to bolster Maine’s clean energy economy. She worked across the aisle to secure needed infrastructure investments and negotiated a key provision that invests in energy storage, so we can better leverage clean energy, lower electricity costs and provide reliable power during storms.

As a result of that bipartisan legislation, Lincoln, a former mill town, will now be the site of the largest long-duration energy storage project in the world to date — a historic investment that will revitalize the town with new jobs and unlock more reliable power for our state. It’s too bad that Vought’s Project 2025 plan calls for the elimination of the kind of funding that Sen. Collins fought for.

And if Vought’s plans aren’t revealing enough, his past actions speak volumes about his character. During President Trump’s first term, Vought held up congressionally approved disaster aid to Puerto Rico in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria, when tens of thousands of Americans were living under tarps. If he was willing to obstruct Congress then, Sen. Collins should ask herself whether he would play politics and deny Maine relief if we are struck by a severe storm.

People in Maine know that America’s challenges — including climate change — require protections rooted in science and expertise, not politics; public servants focused on solutions for our communities, not private interests; and respect for checks and balances in our government, not unchecked presidential power. Russell Vought’s plans and actions leave no doubt that he fundamentally opposes those values.

Sen. Collins should reject his confirmation.