First-term Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-GA) has a little under two years before Election Day, but he’s already preparing to fend off Gov. Brian Kemp (R-GA), who is rumored to be considering challenging him in 2026.
Upon his election in 2020, Ossoff made history by becoming the first millennial senator. While Ossoff has voted in line with the Biden administration agenda 97% of the time, he has expressed he would like to work with the Trump administration, calling himself “one of the most bipartisan members of the Senate.”
Ossoff won the 2020 Georgia Senate runoff election against then-Sen. David Perdue 50.6% to 49.4%, relying heavily on the votes of swing-state voters to bring him to victory.
Now, with rumors of Kemp, a popular term-limited governor who boasts an approval rating of 63%, Ossoff and his team are laying the groundwork to ensure he will win his bid for reelection.
“For four years we have been laying the groundwork and are already building the most effective, the most massive and the best resourced effort to empower an overwhelming and victorious coalition in 2026,” Ossoff said in a statement to the Washington Examiner. “This will be the biggest and most effective turnout effort in the history of Georgia politics.”
One of the first major steps Ossoff took was pressuring Rep. Nikema Williams (D-GA) to step down as Georgia Democratic Party chairwoman, according to a half-dozen party officials. As Republicans won the White House, the Senate, and the House of Representatives, Democrats across the country are now working to assess what went wrong for them and put the pieces back together in preparation for the midterm elections.
Though last month, when asked by a reporter if Ossoff was asking for Williams to step down, the senator did not give a direct answer.
“These are ongoing conversations among Democrats in Georgia. I don’t have anything public to add today,” he said.
But the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported Ossoff told Williams he wanted her to resign.
“I hope this doesn’t have to become public, but this is something I’m absolutely planning to pursue,” Williams said Ossoff told her. Allies of Ossoff said that this statement is not word for word but that Ossoff did iterate a similar message to Williams.
Georgia was a surprise swing state that delivered huge wins for President Joe Biden and Democrats in 2020. The state was up for grabs again in 2024, though voters decided to return to their roots and favored President-elect Donald Trump.
Ossoff can look around and recognize that while most voters in the state lean toward the GOP, they supported him once, and he has a chance to keep them on his side. In 2020, he appealed to voters’ warm feelings toward Israel, though his recent wobbling on his support for the country could hurt him in two years.
Writing in the Atlantic Jewish Times in 2020, Ossoff explained that his Jewish identity has played a major role in his convictions and how he operates in the world.
“I am a committed supporter of the State of Israel,” Ossoff wrote. “I have family in Jerusalem, and I am committed to Israel’s security as a homeland for the Jewish people, as I am committed to supporting American diplomatic engagement to negotiate a lasting peace between Israelis and Palestinians.”
But a war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza and loud calls from the left wing of his party to stop sending Israel cash and weapons to defend itself has softened his resolve.
He voted in favor of a pair of failed resolutions that would limit U.S. weapons sales to Israel.
This led to 50 Atlanta establishment Jewish institutions to criticize Ossoff, and he even was chastised by the rabbi of the temple where he celebrated his bar mitzvah, who said Ossoff showed “indifference to the pro-Israel community while granting approval to fringe voices.”
At the same time, 100 Jewish Georgians wrote a letter standing behind Ossoff, saying he has “repeatedly stood by Israel in its right to defend itself” and that the vote to restrict arms sales helped advance “regional stability, security and peace.”
Ossoff compared his decision to vote in favor of the resolution to the 1982 decision made by then-President Ronald Reagan to block the sale of cluster-type artillery shells to Israel.
“And Israel, faced by President Reagan’s ultimatum, adjusted its policy to accommodate America’s demand,” Ossoff said. “The United States remained Israel’s closest ally, and the world kept turning.”
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While Kemp, who is popular with voters but has a strained relationship with Trump and the party as a whole, has remained mum on whether he is going to run, Ossoff is acknowledging his vulnerabilities and how a popular former governor could exploit them.
The Washington Examiner reached out to Ossoff’s office for comment.
