Democratic Senator Jon Ossoff and his Republican challenger, Representative Mike Collins, debate Tuesday night for the second and last time before November 3, with the race leaning toward the incumbent. The matchup closes the Atlanta Press Club's debate series on the same day early voting opens across Georgia.
"The trial of Mike Collins" is how Ossoff framed their first meeting, an Atlanta News First debate last Thursday. He spent the hour going after Collins on alleged ties to white nationalists, a pending ethics investigation and his loyalty to Trump, more than a dozen times in all. Collins painted Ossoff as an out-of-touch liberal and stood by Trump's tariffs and the war against Iran.
Ossoff won his seat in 2020. This is his first reelection, and it is the only Democratic Senate seat on the ballot in a state Donald Trump carried two years ago. Collins, who represents Georgia's 10th Congressional District, won the GOP nomination in a June runoff.
Republicans control the Senate 53-47. For a majority, Democrats would have to flip four seats and hold every one they already have, Georgia among them.
Newsweek reached out to Ossoff and Collins campaigns for comment.
How to Watch the Ossoff-Collins Debate
The Senate debate begins at 8 p.m. ET on Tuesday, October 13, live from Georgia Public Broadcasting’s studios in Midtown Atlanta. It will be available via the Atlanta Press Club live stream and in the player below.
What the Latest Polls Show
Ossoff has led in every public poll released since the summer. How big the lead is depends on who is asking.
Trafalgar Group, a firm generally regarded as leaning Republican, released the newest numbers: Ossoff 51 percent, Collins 43 percent, with 5.9 percent undecided. The survey of 1,101 likely voters ran October 7 to 9 and carries a margin of error of plus or minus 2.9 percentage points. In September, the same pollster had Ossoff up 6.
Wedgewood Poll found a wider gap, 55 percent to 45 percent, among 600 likely voters interviewed October 2 and 3. Big Data Poll put Ossoff ahead 52.2 percent to 41 percent with likely voters in late September.
Quantus Insights was closer. Its mid-September survey had Ossoff at 48.2 percent and Collins at 44.4 percent. Independents favored the Democrat 42 percent to 29 percent, and geography split hard: Ossoff led by 17 points in the Atlanta media market while Collins carried rural Georgia by 28.
RealClearPolitics' average showed Ossoff up nearly eight points in late September, 51.1 percent to 43.3 percent.
An August InsiderAdvantage poll had the race at 50 percent to 43 percent. "Georgia simply is not a double-digit type of state for either party these days," said Matt Towery, the firm's chairman.
Forecasters have moved in the same direction. The Cook Political Report shifted Georgia from "Lean Democrat" to "Likely Democrat" in late September, matching Sabato's Crystal Ball.
Prediction markets have shifted sharply toward Ossoff. As of Tuesday, Kalshi gave him a 95.2 percent chance of winning and Polymarket 96 percent, up from just under 75 percent on Kalshi in January.
What Voters Are Most Concerned About
Cost of living, above everything else.
Prices have topped Georgians' list of worries in nearly every survey this year. A bipartisan AARP poll of 1,060 likely voters, fielded July 13 to 16 by Fabrizio Ward and Impact Research, found the economy and cost of living ranked first in every statewide race.
The war with Iran has folded into that anxiety. A Wick survey of 1,175 likely voters taken June 27 to 30 found 59 percent concerned about the war's effect on prices and household costs, while 33 percent said they worried about Iran developing or deploying a nuclear weapon.
Metro Atlanta inflation ran 2.9 percent year over year in August, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and federal officials have pointed to the war as one driver.
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Health care is a close second for many voters. A University of Georgia poll for the nonprofit Georgia Health Initiative, released in August, found 77 percent of likely voters consider a candidate's health care views important to their vote. Sixty-two percent said care is unaffordable, and 36 percent said they had skipped or delayed treatment in the past year because of cost. Ossoff accuses Collins of voting with Trump to double premiums for more than a million Georgians.
Then there are data centers, an issue that barely registered a few years ago. The AARP poll found worry about them cuts evenly across party lines, and a Sachs Media survey for Science for Georgia this summer found three in four Georgians concerned about data center development, mostly over electricity bills, water supply and noise. An Emerson College poll in March had 47 percent opposed to building one in or near their community, against roughly 31 percent in favor. When a moderator raised the topic Thursday, the exchange turned personal within seconds.
Many political analysts expect Thursday’s debate themes to carry into the next round, with a focus on the cost of living, the Iran war and immigration.
Affordability was the first issue. Ossoff said Collins backed tariffs that “have crushed families and small businesses in Georgia” and promised to repeal them. Collins blamed inflation on the Biden administration. Asked how he would lower costs, he pointed to energy independence and exports through the Port of Savannah.
The Iran war is also part of the economic debate. Ossoff accused Collins of voting seven times to support the war, which he linked to rising gas prices. He also accused Collins of backing Trump on votes that doubled health insurance premiums for more than a million Georgians. Collins defended the war as necessary to prevent Iran from developing a nuclear weapon.
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On immigration, Collins accused Ossoff of wanting to defund ICE and the Border Patrol. Ossoff said Americans deserve secure borders but criticized Collins for supporting raids that rounded up workers at job sites without evidence of criminal activity. They also clashed over election security. Collins criticized Ossoff for opposing the SAVE Act, while Ossoff said Collins and Trump remained focused on overturning the 2020 election.
Collins’s record is also likely to come under scrutiny. Ossoff has pointed to a House ethics investigation into allegations that Collins’s office used government funds to pay a top aide’s girlfriend for work she did not perform. He has also cited antisemitic videos posted by Collins’s son-in-law and posts featuring Ku Klux Klan imagery from a former staffer. Collins has said he condemns racism and antisemitism.
Collins, meanwhile, has tried to link Ossoff to left-wing podcaster Hasan Piker and Michigan Democratic Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed. He has also pointed to donations from tech investor Reid Hoffman, who had ties to Jeffrey Epstein.
Newsweek’s reporters and editors used Martyn, our AI assistant, to produce this story. Learn more about Martyn here. Contact Newsweek editors on this story: Jason Lemon and Gray R. Thomas