Susan Collins Rips Hunter Biden Plea Deal, Questions President Biden's Involvement in Suspect Foreign Business Deals [AUDIO]

Republican Maine Sen. Susan Collins joined WVOM’s George Hale and Ric Tyler Show in-studio Friday morning to discuss the most recent indictment of former President Trump, the Hunter Biden investigation and failed plea deal, and updates on her most recent visits to Maine.

Trump was arraigned in a Washington, D.C., federal court Thursday on charges related to his role in the Jan. 6 protest at the capitol building and an alleged conspiracy to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election.

[RELATED: Biden DOJ Indicts Trump for Jan. 6 Role]

“It was unprecedented, and clearly former President Trump’s legal troubles are piling up,” Sen. Collins said of the most recent Trump indictment. “But I think it’s important that we remember that he deserves his day in court, that he has not had a chance to defend himself in court, and that we’re just going to have to wait and see what happens.”

This statement from Collins comes just a day after she revealed in Norway that she would not be supporting the former president’s bid for the White House in 2024.

“Well first of all, I would mention that we have many terrific candidates who are running for the nomination,” Collins said, WGME reported Thursday. “That includes Tim Scott, Nikki Haley, Asa Hutchinson, Chris Christie, Michael Pence, we have a lot of good choices and to me, each of those choices would be a better choice than re-nominating Donald Trump. I think America is ready for change on both sides and that it’s time to move on.”

Collins did not mention Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis or businessman Vivek Ramaswamy, two candidates who have often polled in the runners-up positions behind Trump.

Sen. Collins was then asked to address the recent allegations against Hunter Biden.

On Monday, Hunter’s ex-business partner Devon Archer testified that then-Vice President Biden was put on speakerphone over 20 times during business meetings, including with foreign executives.

At the end of July, a plea deal that would have allowed Hunter Biden to avoid jail time for two misdemeanor tax charges and a felony gun possession charge fell through after a federal judge in Delaware was concerned that the deal was overbroad, and would allow Biden to avoid future criminal charges that might be filed as part of an ongoing Justice Department investigation.

[RELATED: Hunter Biden Pleads Not Guilty As Plea Deal Falls Through, Facing Possible Foreign Agent Charge]

“The allegations against Hunter Biden are serious, and they do deserve the same kind of in-depth investigation, particularly since in some of the reports President Biden is cited as well,” Collins said. “Now, I don’t know whether those reports are accurate or not, but that’s why they need to be thoroughly investigated.”

“We need to have an equal system of justice here, and surely it is telling that the judge refused the plea bargain that was worked out between Hunter Biden and the prosecutor,” she said.

“That’s unusual, for a judge to refuse a plea bargain. And that suggests to me that it was unusual in it’s nature, and requires further investigation,” she added.

Sen. Collins then moved on to discussing her most recent visit to Maine, which included a tour at Compotech in Brewer.

Compotech is a Maine-based defense technology and manufacturing company which has developed a new, lightweight and rapidly deployable ballistic shield for military applications.

“To me, it’s so exciting that this work is being done in Brewer, Maine, and the firm has increased the number of people that it’s employed. It now has about 45 people working there,” Collins said.

“A lot of them are young engineers out of the University of Maine — I love that, because we need to keep our young people in Maine. These are good jobs,” she added.

Collins said that she is “saddened” by Maine’s transition away from “legacy manufacturing,” but that she is hopeful about new industries coming to the state.

“This represents the transition that we’re going through in the State of Maine, from our legacy manufacturing companies, like paper mills — and it saddens me to see our paper mills closed in so many small towns, because in a lot of those towns they were the heart and soul of the economy,” Collins said.

“But what we’re seeing is new uses of what — we’ve seen it not only at Compotech, but I was in Madison recently, where the old Madison paper mill has been repurposed to make wood-based insulation,” she said.

Collins said that she was helping manufacturing companies compete for contracts with the Department of Defense.

Bringing manufacturing jobs back to the U.S. and Maine was the primary focus of President Biden’s speech at Auburn Manufacturing last Friday.

Following Biden’s visit to Auburn, the Maine Wire did an analysis of manufacturing jobs in Maine under Gov. Janet Mills’ administration.

About 2,150 manufacturing jobs were gained in the State of Maine under Gov. Mills, according to Maine Department of Labor data, despite $8,800,000,000 in federal COVID-19 spending directed to the state.

That’s roughly one manufacturing job for every $4 million received by the state in COVID-19 relief funds.

[RELATED: Bidenomics: A Look at Maine Manufacturing by the Numbers]