Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-GA) began his reelection campaign this weekend by attacking President Donald Trump‘s administration.
Though Ossoff didn’t explicitly say his Saturday Atlanta event was his election launch, others, including Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-GA), made it clear that Ossoff’s team was focused on 2026. Speaking to a crowd of 2,000 supporters, Ossoff painted Trump as a tyrant who was out of touch with ordinary people.
“Georgia will bow to no king!” he declared, also alleging Trump was “trying to poison our democracy with fear and intimidation.”
“Atlanta, this is not a drill. Atlanta, this is not a bad dream,” Ossoff said. “As citizens, this is the test of our lifetime. So tell me, Atlanta, are you ready to fight?”
The Georgia senator spoke to the current moment, urging Democrats to keep up their fight against Trump.
“Maybe right now you feel surrounded by darkness. You might be a little numb. You might be wondering if there’s a way out,” he said. “But Atlanta, we don’t have the luxury of despair.”
The Georgia senator also pointed blame at corruption in politics.
“This is why things don’t work for ordinary people,” Ossoff continued. “It’s not because of trans kids or woke college students or because our new archenemy, Canada. The corruption is why you pay a fortune for prescriptions. The corruption is why your insurance claim keeps getting denied. The corruption is why hedge funds get to buy up all the houses in your neighborhood.”
Ossoff is an uncommon Democratic senator in a state carried by Trump in the 2024 election. Trump won the state by two percentage points in November.
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The Democrat is considered one of the most vulnerable in the country. Gov. Brian Kemp (R-GA) has been floated as a likely candidate. Reps. Buddy Carter (R-GA), Rich McCormick (R-GA), Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), Mike Collins (R-GA), and Insurance Commissioner John King have also been considered as Republican contenders.
Ossoff narrowly defeated then-incumbent Sen. David Perdue in 2021. His election, along with Warnock’s, was one of the most expensive in the country, with OpenSecrets putting the combined total at over $900 million.
