A Career Public Servant, Senator Collins' Portfolio Grew $3 Million in A Decade
Maine Senator Susan Collins Is The Latest In Our Series Tracking How Politicians' Wealth Changes Over Time
Marriage entails numerous changes: sharing hopes, dreams, space and, oh, an entire life together.
For Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine), it also meant a notable shift in her financial fortunes, rocketing her from one of Congress’ least wealthy members during the early Obama administration to millionaire status in the age of Donald Trump, according to a Hunter Index analysis of U.S. Senate financial disclosure records.
Collins’ minimum net worth in 2024 was $3.35 million, according to federal disclosures.
What a difference a dozen years makes. Entering 2012, Collins — now chair of the Senate appropriations panel — was decidedly in the red, her estimated net worth languishing around -$255k.
In 2012, Collins had two bank accounts valued at between $15k and $50k each, a deferred compensation plan valued at between $15k and $50k and two individual retirement accounts — one worth between $15k and $50k and the other worth between $50k and $100k.
But debt associated with two home mortgages — combined value of $350k to $750k — plus a home equity line of credit worth up to $50k easily eclipsed her assets.
Federal lawmakers are only required to disclose the values of most assets and debts in broad ranges.
Enter policy and political consultant Thomas Daffron, whom Collins wed in August 2012.
Upon marrying their money together, Collins enjoyed an instant jolt of wealth beyond her annual salary of $174k.
She filled her 2013 annual personal financial disclosure, which members of Congress must file by law, with dozens of stock holdings, bonds and other financial assets absent from her disclosure just the year before.
By 2024, Collins lived as a solid millionaire, her portfolio filled with dozens of different investments, most attributed to Daffron.
Collins’ reported stock holdings through Daffron include shares of Google parent Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Berkshire Hathaway, oil company ConocoPhillips, pharmaceutical giant Johnson & Johnson, pharmaceutical company Merck, Microsoft, Pepsico, UnitedHealth Group, Visa, The Walt Disney Company and defense contractors Boeing and RTX.
Some of those shares are in companies that ostensibly fall under the jurisdiction of other Senate committees on which Collins sits, including the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions and the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.
Collins still reported a mortgage in 2024, but its value had shrunk to somewhere between $250k and $500k.
In a statement to the Hunter Index, Collins spokesperson Blake Kernen said that Collins “does not own any shares of stock in individual companies, and she has never owned any shares of stock. Her investments such as her IRA are in mutual funds. Her IRA and the deferred compensation she received working in state government have grown incrementally over time. Since she does not own any stocks, she has had little change in her financial situation other than when she married Tom in 2012.”
Kernen added: “Her husband, Tom Daffron, has no involvement in the purchase or sale of any of the stocks in his diversified portfolio. These investment decisions are made exclusively by a third-party advisor without consultation with him, and many were made before he and Senator Collins were married in 2012.”
Kernen did not address questions about whether Collins, in principle, supports bipartisan legislation that aims to ban members of Congress and their spouses from buying and selling individual stock.
After graduating from St. Lawrence University in 1975, Collins started her long career in public service working for her home state Senator William S. Cohen of Maine.
Dave Levinthal is a Washington, D.C.-based investigative reporter.
Why Does It Matter?
Please be informed of your politicians’ personal finances.
That’s our goal at the Hunter Index. We believe it is important for constituents to understand how their government officials’ personal finances may affect their policy making decisions as well as understanding the potential wide disparity between their wealth and that of the people in their home state or district.
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