The race for the Republican Senate seat in Georgia is heading to a runoff next month since no candidate managed to secure a majority in Tuesday’s primary vote. This leaves incumbent Senator Jon Ossoff (D-Ga.) without a confirmed opponent for a while longer.
Leading the primary was Rep. Mike Collins (R-Ga.), who captured approximately 41% of the vote. Trailing him was former University of Tennessee football coach Derek Dooley, who secured 30%. These two will now compete in a runoff scheduled for June 16 to determine the Republican nominee.
Rep. Buddy Carter (R-Ga.) fell short, finishing in third place with 25% of the vote. This tally was determined with about three-fourths of the votes counted on Tuesday night.
The winner between Collins and Dooley will face off against Ossoff (D-Ga.) in the November elections.
Republicans view Ossoff as one of the most at-risk Democratic senators, as they aim to strengthen their 53-47 majority in the Senate during the upcoming fall midterms.
Collins has positioned himself as the candidate most capable of flipping Georgia red this November, emphasizing his established record of success.
“You don’t beat Jon Ossoff with no record. You win by having a record of results. I’ve shown that you can go to Washington and put Georgians first,” Collins said at his victory party.
Dooley, who coached for 30 years, celebrated his outsider status at his election party.
âThey counted us out. They said that Mike Collins had this race in the bag. … We proved them dead wrong tonight, and we got all the momentum,” Dooley cheered.
“Beating Jon Ossoff is not going to be done by another DC politician,” Dooley said
Pre-primary polling showed the Ossoff running narrowly ahead of all three Republican contenders.
President Trump made no endorsement in the contest, and term-limited Republican Gov. Brian Kemp â who rebuffed overtures to run against Ossoff himself â threw his support behind Dooley, a family friend and the son of legendary University of Georgia coach Vince Dooley.
âMy goal here is to win our Senate seat back,â Kemp said at a Dooley campaign event last week. âWe need a political outsider to do that.â
âAs a football coach for 30 years, I can spot these âme firstâ guys a mile away, and we gotta get rid of them,â Dooley said in his first campaign ad of the race. âAnd as your senator, Iâll never forget that youâre the boss. And they need accountability: term limits, ban stock trading, end these government shutdowns.Â
âAnd up there, Iâm gonna work with President Trump, but for you,â the 57-year-old pledged.
Meanwhile, Collins and Carter jockeyed to position themselves as the most MAGA-aligned candidates from Capitol Hill.
âGeorgia needs the right Republican to take on Jon Ossoff. Someone who’s delivered, has the conservative record to prove it, and had President Trump’s back when it mattered most,â Collins, 58, wrote on X last week. âSend this trucker to the US Senate and I’ll deliver.â
Collins, dubbed the “Memer of Congress” for his prolific and creative use of his official X account, has touted his work to crack down on criminal migrants and synthetic opioids via the Laken Riley Act and TRANQ Act, respectively, and voiced support for Trumpâs sweeping election integrity bill, the SAVE America Act.
Carter, who has served in Congress since 2015, hit Collins on the campaign trail over a House Ethics Committee probe into whether he abused taxpayer funds by hiring the girlfriend of his former chief of staff, now his campaign adviser, for work that the woman allegedly did not perform.
âIf taxpayers canât trust you to properly steward their money, how can they trust you to be a US senator?â Carter, 68, asked Collins during a recent debate.
Georgia voters havenât elected a Republican to the Senate since 2016, when the late Johnny Isakson defeated Democrat Jim Barksdale.
Trump won the Peach State by 2.2 percentage points in 2024, after losing it to Joe Biden by just 0.2 percentage points four years earlier.
With Post wires
