Steve Abbott is a Maine attorney and political aide who has managed Susan Collins's Senate campaigns. He previously served as her chief of staff. He served as chief of staff for 25 years and managed her 2002, 2008, 2014 and 2020 reelection campaigns. In March 2026, Collins named him manager of her 2026 campaign.
DI has documented statements by Steve Abbott on 2026 Midterm Elections, Campaign Finance, and Government Spending, among other topics. Read the quotations, original sources and related cases below.
Role at the time: Campaign manager for Susan Collins
Denied
Statement summary
Collins campaign manager Steve Abbott points to a photo of Collins meeting Kao in her office months before any donation and says it shows that ProPublica's account, that Kao had to donate before he could see Collins, is not true.
“ProPublica has the theory that Martin Kao, based on Martin Kao's word, had to make a donation before he could get in to see Susan Collins. As you can see from that picture, it's not true”
The case asks whether Collins traded support for Navatek's federal contracts for campaign donations. Abbott rejects a central part of that account, that Kao had to donate before meeting Collins, so we used the denies label.
Role at the time: Campaign manager for Susan Collins
Denied
Statement summary
Steve Abbott denied that Collins exchanged contracts for campaign money and rejected the allegation that her campaign charged for meetings.
“did not happen”
Open source (opens in a new tab)Collins campaign and John Thune respond to Navatek allegationsConcluding paragraph, Thune's response; Opening section, Wednesday campaign-manager response
Why we used this label
Abbott explicitly denies that the alleged exchange happened.
Martin Kao alleged that Susan Collins knowingly linked Navatek campaign support to federal-contract assistance. Collins's office and other participants deny a quid pro quo, while official records establish separate illegal contributions by Navatek-linked actors.
