There’s a competitive, three-way Republican Senate primary in Georgia with no clear frontrunner — the exact scenario the GOP desperately wanted to avoid after a string of embarrassing losses in the Peach State.
The three Republican candidates — Derek Dooley and Reps. Mike Collins (Ga.) and Buddy Carter (Ga.) — all have a legitimate chance of advancing to take on Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-Ga.). But President Donald Trump hasn’t yet weighed in. We’re told that some Republicans think the field isn’t set yet, hinting at a late entrance by another candidate.
So how did we get here?
Georgia Republicans lost their top recruit when Gov. Brian Kemp passed on a run in May. Even though Kemp said at the time he’d work with the White House to coalesce around a candidate, in August the governor went and endorsed Dooley — a former college football coach and political newcomer.
Dooley raised $1.9 million in the first eight weeks of his campaign. Dooley’s haul, while impressive, was below what some expected given his access to Kemp’s donor list.
Collins also raised $1.1 million to his Senate account Q3 — plus a further $800,000 to his victory fund — and ended the period with $2.3 million on hand. Collins, who has a claim for the strongest MAGA bona fides in the race, chipped away at the perception that he was a weak fundraiser.
Carter, who’s largely self-funding his campaign, has been spending millions of dollars on the airwaves presenting himself as a “MAGA warrior,” a claim that many Republicans view as somewhat dubious given Carter’s more mild-mannered demeanor.
The bottom line? All three are viable, but none seem to have the firepower at this juncture to make Ossoff sweat. Ossoff raised $12 million in Q3 and has a war chest of $21 million.
Ossoff has leaned into shoring up his left flank in recent months, suggesting Trump should be impeached and refusing to join with some moderate Democrats to back GOP funding bills.
