After being reelected as Senate president, Troy Jackson talked about his unlikely rise to political power and how he planned to be “a different leader for a different age.”

Jackson, a logger from the north woods who speaks with a thick accent, said he never planned to seek elected office. But he felt compelled to run in the early 2000s because he didn’t believe government was working for everyday folks.

“I believe I’m at this rostrum today because I lead with my heart and that’s what I intend to do this session,” Jackson said on Dec. 1, 2020. “When you grow up, never expecting to go to college, never feeling like you fit in a suit, and never seeing yourself as anything but a working class person, you certainly don’t expect to find yourself here.”

Jackson, a 58-year-old former logger, served for 20 years in the Maine Legislature. He spent his last eight years as the Senate Democratic leader, including the last six years as the body’s president, from 2018 through 2024. His party controlled both chambers and the governor’s mansion during that time.

Few would say Jackson didn’t, in fact, lead with his heart. But his passion often ruffled feathers, including among people in his own party. National news outlets have begun reporting on Jackson’s temper, recounting one story about him yelling and throwing a water bottle during a heated argument with a fellow Democrat.

Now, the Allagash native, is expected to lock up the Democratic nomination to take on Republican Susan Collins in Maine’s U.S. Senate race this fall. His track record in public office hints at what kind of candidate he’ll be — and what kind of U.S. Senator he might one day become. Let’s run through a few key moments.

1. Expanding abortion access post-Dobbs (2022)

Jackson first ran for office in 2000 as a socially conservative Republican, but lost. Two years later, he ran as an independent and won. Then he became a Democrat.

But even as a Democrat, Jackson held conservative social views, including opposing abortion and being a strong supporter of gun rights. But over the last decade or so he has taken more progressive policy stances, especially on abortion.

When the U.S. Supreme Court ended national abortion protections in 2022, Jackson signed onto Gov. Janet Mills’ bill to expand access in Maine. The bill would allow a woman to receive a medically necessary abortion at any time during pregnancy.

The bill dominated that legislative session, drawing hours of passionate testimony in committee rooms, filling the hallways with advocates and opponents, and evoking heartbreaking floor speeches.

Jackson never addressed the bill from the Senate floor. But he did join other leaders for at least one press conference with Dana Peirce, a Yarmouth woman whose story of having to travel to Colorado to terminate an inviable pregnancy motivated lawmakers to act.

Before the expansion, Maine’s law allowed an abortion until fetal viability, which generally occurs between 22 and 24 weeks.

In her 32nd week of pregnancy, Peirce said in an op-ed, her doctor advised her that her baby, Cameron, had a rare gene mutation. He had broken bones. His rib cage was too small for his lungs. And if he survived birth, he would be unable to breathe.

“I want to apologize to Dana for our law not actually being strong enough (so) that you had to go through what you did,” Jackson said at a press conference in support of the bill.

“People in this state need to know that government isn’t standing in their way,” he continued. “It’s doing what it can to make sure that they and their doctors make the decisions, not legislators from all across the state who have absolutely no idea what’s going on in people’s lives.”

2. Post-Lewiston shooting gun reform (2024)

Like many elected officials from rural areas, Jackson, of Allagash, voted repeatedly against gun control bills. His record earned him an endorsement from the National Rifle Association as recently as 2022.

Hunting and gun ownership has long been a part of Maine’s identity. But in October of 2023, 18 people were killed and 13 others were wounded in a mass shooting in Lewiston — a moment that spurred lawmakers, including Jackson, to rethink their opposition to gun control.

Jackson stood side-by-side with other lawmakers as they unveiled a suite of gun safety bills in February 2024. House and Senate Democrats huddled in a room with reporters in the fourth floor of the State House to lay out their plans.

Mills had proposed expanding background checks for private sales. Wanting more, Democrats put forth a ban on rapid-fire devices, such as bump stocks, and floated a three-day waiting period on firearm purchases.

Jackson, who cosponsored the waiting period bill, supported all three, marking another leftward shift in his political evolution.

“The 18 funerals in Lewiston caused me to shift my position,” Jackson said in an interview at the time.

Lawmakers passed all three bills. However, Mills vetoed the bump stock ban and allowed the waiting period bill to become law without her signature. The latter is being challenged in court.

3. Challenging Mills on veto day (2024)

On his last day in the State House, Jackson decided to challenge Mills directly by sending the governor an additional 30 spending bills on a day in which lawmakers are only meant to take up vetoes.

The governor had previously warned lawmakers that they were prohibited by the state constitution from conducting any additional business on what is known as veto day. So she refused to sign any of the bills, effectively killing the legislation.

The last-minute scuffle marked an acrimonious end to the 2024 session.

A dejected Jackson used his last speech to express confusion over why Mills would refuse to accept the bills.

“Today is a hard one,” Jackson said. “Seeing bills we passed, enacted (and) had sent down to the second floor, not once but twice … be rejected, is something I never thought I’d see happen here.”

4. Universal free meals for public school students (2021)

One of Jackson’s signature accomplishments was passing a bill to provide free meals to all public school students.

Stepping down from the rostrum, Jackson talked in 2021 about how the pandemic made him a strong supporter of the proposal.

When schools were shut down to prevent the spread of COVID-19, Jackson said he recalled seeing coolers at the end of driveways in his Aroostook County district. At first he wasn’t sure why. Then he learned that the coolers were for food deliveries.

“Those families must have needed that pretty bad to stick a cooler out at the road for their kids,” said Jackson, who was wearing a face mask.

His voice quivered with emotion as he spoke from the Senate floor.

Jackson talked about how one of his constituents was delayed in receiving her high school diploma because of an outstanding lunch bill, calling it “a ridiculous system.” He said no child should have to go to school hungry and that “it’s really hard not to get choked (up) about” food insecurity.

“I know that feeling well,” he said.

The bill passed unanimously in the Senate, making Maine the second state in the nation to begin providing free meals to students. And the program is still funded today.

5. Advocating for emergency checks for heating assistance (2022)

Shortly after Mills won reelection in 2022, lawmakers began working on a plan to send checks to most Maine residents to help offset the high heating costs.

Negotiations between Democrats and Republicans began before lawmakers were inaugurated in December. Leaders hoped to pass the bill as an emergency after being sworn in so financially strapped residents could quickly receive roughly $450 in financial assistance in a moment of need.

The bill sailed through the House unanimously, but ran into a roadblock in the Senate, where Republicans surprisingly objected over procedural concerns.

In an effort to clear the way for passage, Jackson talked from the rostrum about growing up in financially difficult times.

“If you’ve never lain awake at night listening to the furnace rattle or wondering if it will still be on in the morning, then you probably don’t understand the gravity of the situation,” Jackson said.

Before the vote came, Jackson stepped down from the rostrum to make one last plea with Republicans, who wanted to hold a public hearing on the proposal before voting. The hearing would have delayed the bill by weeks.

He acknowledged the Republicans’ raw feelings from the recent election, and urged them not let their opposition to Mills prevent them from helping thousands of families.

He warned that people who could not afford to fill their oil or propane tanks, or afford firewood, would “come up with some harebrained scheme” to heat their homes without assistance.

“They (will) concoct something that will cause a fire and probably carbon monoxide death,” he said. “And that, you all know, regardless of what you think of me, will happen.”

Jackson didn’t prevail that night. But he worked with House leadership to establish an expedited review and public hearing for the proposal. Senate Republicans ultimately voted to pass the bill a few weeks later.

6. Passing childcare support bill (2023)

It’s not often that the labor unions and the chambers of commerce back the same bill. But that’s exactly what happened when Jackson sponsored a bill in 2023 to bolster the childcare industry by doubling monthly wage stipends for workers and increasing financial assistance to working families.

For years, parents had struggled to find affordable, quality childcare so they could reenter the workforce. And even those who could find a daycare couldn’t afford it, causing many parents to stay home and care for their own children, rather than paying exorbitant fees.

At the same time, local businesses were struggling to fill job openings after the pandemic.

An independent report at the time noted that Maine had about 9,400 available childcare slots that were unfilled simply because of staffing shortages attributed to low wages. That, coupled with parents being excluded from the workforce, cost the economy an estimated $403 million a year.

“When you get the Maine Chamber of Commerce and the Maine AFL-CIO pulling together the same way, in such a huge way, then that tells you that we have issues out there that is clearly cutting across all divide lines in the state,” Jackson said in a floor speech.

The bill passed 33-1 in the Senate and unanimously in the House. Provisions of the bill were ultimately folded into the state budget.

7. Last-minute push for $100 million more in spending (2024)

The clock had just passed midnight on the last business day of the 131st Legislature — the penultimate day of Jackson’s time as Senate president.

Normally, the Senate president doesn’t debate bills. But Jackson stepped down from his perch overlooking the chamber and took a seat among his peers to argue on behalf of a last-minute, multimillion dollar budget amendment.

“(We’re) certainly playing a high-stakes game of chicken here, and people can say that I asked for it,” Jackson said.

Lawmakers were near the end of a bruising legislative session — one marked by controversial issues such as abortion and gun control. And Jackson had just made a series of extraordinary moves to secure spending priorities that were met with skepticism even by some in his own party.

Jackson’s tactics frayed nerves and added considerable drama to the final days of session.

Leading up to that night, Jackson had supported an effort to add roughly $100 million in unrelated spending to an emergency storm recovery bill offered by Mills. The spending would have supported raises for education techs, new behavioral health programs and more funding for nursing homes and state workers.

Fearing a potential economic downturn,the Mills administration called Jackson’s proposal “an insult to fiscal responsibility.”

Jackson’s effort, which he scaled back slightly in the hope of making it more attractive, was blocked in the House. The emergency storm funding, to which he was trying to attach the extra money, was folded into the regular budget proposal. The maneuver delayed the rollout of the storm money for three more months.

Days later, in his nighttime speech, Jackson urged his bleary-eyed colleagues to support a different amendment — one that would add more than $10 million in ongoing spending to the budget to support state workers and school support staff, as well as veterans and nursing homes.

Jackson made an emotional appeal to his colleagues, saying he would be “heartbroken” to face the everyday people he tried to help if the funding didn’t pass.

Jackson did not prevail. And he acknowledged the toll his maneuvers took on his relationships.

“It also bothers me an awful lot that some really good relationships that I’ve made in here — some people that I know I will be friends with for the rest of my life,” he said, “I’ve strained that relationship because I cared so much about these issues and couldn’t understand why we all couldn’t come together on this.”