By Jessica Benton Cooney, CQ Staff

Supporters of two-term Maine Sen. Susan Collins , a Republican moderate, say she is in a good position to rebuff the serious challenge she is receiving this year from six-term Democratic Rep. Tom Allen . Allen’s camp counters that the 1st District congressman is gaining momentum as he improves his name recognition in the 2nd District — which takes in the other half of the state’s population — and pounds on his claim that Collins’ voting record is in line with President Bush and his conservative agenda.

Allen is hoping to manifest the recent partisan trend in a state that long was a “Yankee Republican” stronghold but has gone Democratic for president in each of the past four elections. But Collins, like senior Maine Republican Sen. Olympia J. Snowe , fits the mold of the kind of centrist Republican who can still draw strong support from state voters. CQ Politics currently rates the race as Leans Republican, which means Collins has at least a slight edge in a contest that nonetheless is highly competitive.

Allen is stepping up his effort to position himself for the November general election during this week’s congressional break for the July 4 holiday. After spending several days in Bangor — the state’s third-most populous city and home base of two-term Democratic Gov. John Baldacci — Allen will make a jaunt to the far northern county of Aroostook, best known as a potato-growing region. Both places are located in the 2nd District.

While Allen is actively campaigning, this summer appears to be quieter than last when Americans United Against Escalation in Iraq targeted Collins and other GOP lawmakers as not taking a strong enough stand to end the conflict, and the liberal political action group, MoveOn.org, staged fundraising and advertising activity in the state on behalf of Allen.

A staunch advocate of ending the Iraq war, Allen held a conference call on June 20 to discuss recent news reports concerning estimates of “$23 billion in waste, fraud and abuse in Iraq by private war contractors.” He accused Collins, who he said served as chairwoman of the chief oversight committee from 2003 through 2006, of refusing to hold hearings on such problems in Iraq.

Longtime politics watchers in the state say, however, that the war, as a priority issue for Maine voters, has dropped below pressing kitchen-table concerns such as the struggling economy and high home heating costs. Christian Potholm, government professor at Bowdoin College in Brunswick, said, “Unfortunately for [Allen], the wheel didn’t stay swung on the war.”

Collins’ campaign maintains that she has led in every poll since Allen announced his candidacy, and that her approval numbers have hovered around 70 percent since the race began. They further note that Collins has consistently raised more campaign funds than Allen.

In what is on track to be the state’s most expensive race ever, the candidates have yet to launch television ads, but they will both be able to run major media campaigns. Their most recent Federal Election Commission report numbers as of May 21 — filed prior to the June 10 primary in which Collins was unopposed and Allen had token opposition — show they both have ample cash. Collins reported $4.6 million cash on hand, with a receipts total of $5.4 million, while Allen had a bit less than $2.6 million cash on hand out of a total of close to $4 million.

Carol Andrews, communications director for Allen, stated in a previous interview with CQ Politics that she is confident in the Democratic challenger’s fundraising power. She said Allen is “never going to raise what Collins is going to” as the incumbent, but will have enough to be competitive and “do what we need to.”

Anthony Corrado, professor of government at Colby College in Waterville, also projects strong fundraising in the next quarter, for an election cycle total of between $10 to $14 million raised between the candidates. He said, “I don’t doubt Allen will surpass $5 million in this race, and [Collins] is going to get $7 million.”

That money gap could be filled to a great extent by independent expenditures deployed by the national Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC), which, benefiting from the party’s majority status in Congress, has much more money available for the fall campaigns than its partisan counterpart, the National Republican Senatorial Committee.

The national Democratic trend in congressional politics launched by the party’s success in the 2006 midterm elections has strategists talking about the possibility of a huge nine-seat pickup to gain a “filibuster-proof” majority of 60 seats. Inherent in that longshot scenario are upset Democratic victories in states such as Maine.

The Maine candidates’ campaigns have debated how close the race currently is. The debate was prompted in part by a Rasmussen Reports poll released on June 16 that put Collins ahead by 7 percentage points, with 49 percent to Allen’s 42 percent. This stands in contrast to the firm’s April surveys, in which Collins held a 16 percentage point edge, and in May when she led by 10 points.