While Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-GA) maintains his lead in recent polling in Georgia’s Senate race, his gubernatorial ballot line counterpart, former Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms, is neck-and-neck in her race against GOP businessman Rick Jackson.
The Democrats running in Georgia’s top elections are facing quite different circumstances despite their similar statewide campaigns, recent surveys show. Ossoff’s name recognition, status as an incumbent, and fundraising abilities have boosted his candidacy in the purple state, while Bottoms battles Jackson for the large portion of undecided voters in the gubernatorial race.
Jackson edged out Bottoms by 0.5 percentage points in a recent Wick poll. The poll showed Jackson with 43.2% support from surveyed voters, compared to Bottoms’s 42.7%, with 14.1% undecided.
Comparatively, the survey had Ossoff leading his GOP opponent, Rep. Mike Collins (R-GA), with 46.7% support, Collins at 42.9%, and 10.4% undecided.
The Wick poll also came one week after a Fox News poll showing Ossoff with a double-digit lead over President Donald Trump-endorsed Collins. In that poll, Bottoms held a 5-percentage-point margin over Jackson.
Despite Bottoms and Ossoff stumping together and running on similar affordability and anti-Beltway corruption messages, the two have different election scenarios. This is Bottoms’s first gubernatorial general election, while Ossoff is running as an incumbent. Ossoff is one of the Senate’s most proven fundraisers, with over $32.5 million in cash on hand so far in this election cycle alone. Bottoms, on the other hand, has a multimillion-dollar fundraising deficit to make up against her billionaire general election opponent, per Politico.
Bottoms also had to run in a primary, facing off against six other candidates vying for the spot, while Ossoff faced no primary challenge, cruising to the general election with more consolidated support.
Furthermore, Ossoff is running for a federal seat, for which Georgians have proven willing to elect a Democrat. The state has two Democratic Senators, Ossoff and Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-GA), and swung Joe Biden’s way in the 2020 presidential election by 0.2 percentage points.
Meanwhile, the Peach State has not elected a Democrat for governor since 1999, and Gov. Brian Kemp (R-GA) is finishing up his popular two-term stint at the helm of the state’s executive branch.
On the Senate side, while Ossoff did not have to go to bat for his party’s nomination, Collins pulled away from his GOP runoff with an 11-percentage-point margin of victory over Kemp-backed Derek Dooley. But Collins has yet to consolidate all the support from voters who supported Dooley and the other leading primary candidate, Rep. Buddy Carter (R-GA), into his base, per multiple polls.
OSSOFF HOLDS DOUBLE-DIGIT ADVANTAGE OVER COLLINS AFTER BRUISING GOP PRIMARY: POLL
However, pundits still see an opportunity for Collins to cut down Ossoff’s margin and make the Senate race competitive.
“My hunch is the race will become much more competitive, but Collins has work to do convincing Republicans and independents that he and the president can make things more affordable for rank-and-file Georgians,” poll analyst Daron Shaw told Fox News.