It was debate night in Georgia, but President Donald Trump and former President Joe Biden appeared to be on stage.
Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff and Republican Mike Collins faced off Thursday in the first debate of this nationally consequential Senate race, with both trying to fight for policies implemented by the current and former president.
Ossoff repeatedly asked why Collins supported the tariffs that were a key factor in the rising cost of consumer goods that kept Trump’s approval ratings at historic lows, a question Collins never directly answered.
“I still haven’t heard an explanation on the tariffs,” Ossoff said after already asking several questions about Trump’s tariff regime.
Collins spent the hour-long debate, hosted by Atlanta’s WANF-TV, not directly answering questions about the unpopular war in Iran or Trump’s economy, but rather trying to impose on Ossoff the votes he took during the Biden administration to argue that Biden is the reason for the current state of inflation and high prices.
“This Bidenomics, this Green New Deal that my opponent voted for, that’s where this inflation is coming from,” Collins said.
The debate was divided into four segments, but each was dominated in one way or another by the economy and consumer prices, topics that an NBC News poll shows are the most important issues on voters’ minds as Election Day approaches.
Collins voted to support the so-called One Big Beautiful Bill, the biggest legislative achievement of Trump’s second term. The bill included provisions including no taxes on hotel workers’ tips and Social Security, which are regular midterm talking points for Republicans. But Democrats have consistently emphasized how this sweeping tax proposal disproportionately benefits the wealthy and increases the federal deficit by $1.4 trillion.
“Tax cuts are the solution to keeping more money in people’s pockets,” Collins said. “It creates…more taxpayers and businesses grow.”
As Trump’s approval rating has plummeted, helping Democrats overcome the Republican Party’s enormous domestic financial advantage, Republican candidates across the country have distanced themselves from him on key policies ranging from tariffs to the war in Iran. Collins, however, is not among them, maintaining his place as one of Trump’s staunchest allies in the key midterm Senate elections.
Ossoff repeatedly asked Collins why he supported Trump’s economic and foreign affairs policies.
He said Trump’s tariffs made things “fair” in trade with China and helped Georgia’s ports, which are critical to the state’s economy.
“The ports of Savannah and Brunswick concern me,” he said, without elaborating on how the tariffs have helped them.
Pressed by the increasingly unpopular war in Iran, Collins defended Trump’s decision to launch bombing attacks on Israel in February.
“The president had every right to make sure that Iran did not acquire a nuclear weapon. Jon Ossoff knows that,” he said.
Ossoff also regularly attacked Collins for continuing to support Trump’s insistence, without evidence, that the 2020 presidential election was stolen, an issue that also took center stage during the debate.
“Mike Collins and Donald Trump are still obsessed with overturning the 2020 election,” Ossoff said.
Collins did not back down from the idea that the 2020 election was stolen, but focused on GOP ballot measures and said Ossoff opposed the SAVE Act, a Trump-backed bill that, among other things, would require proof of citizenship to register to vote.
“Voters need confidence,” Collins said. “We live in the best country in the world and there is no reason why we can’t have the most secure elections in the world. »
The bill passed the House, but it did not receive enough support in the Republican-led Senate.
Each candidate also attempted to portray the other as scandal-ridden.
Ossoff hit Collins for a series of social media posts in which his son-in-law promoted white nationalist posts.
“Imagine running for the U.S. Senate while neo-Nazi propaganda is broadcast from your home to millions of people,” Ossoff said. “Mike Collins is a fanatic.”
Collins said he does not support racism or anti-Semitism, and he said he told his family that.
“I don’t care where the source is, and I tell him,” Collins said of his son-in-law.
In contrast, Collins said billionaire Reid Hoffman, whose name appeared in the Epstein files, was an Ossoff donor.
“Billionaire Reid Hoffman, also one of Epstein’s friends, pumped money into his campaign,” Collins said.
Authorities have not accused Hoffman of wrongdoing in connection with Epstein. Hoffman said he regretted associating with Epstein.
Ossoff has been the subject of significant national speculation about whether he will run for president in 2028, which he says he has “no interest in,” but that hasn’t stopped him from being on early short lists.
That idea is bolstered by the fact that $50 million of the more than $100 million he has raised comes from so-called small donors, which are relatively small contributions typically raised by email and other digital means from supporters across the country. The ability to raise money digitally at that time is generally a sign of a candidate’s national identification and support among the party’s most intense base voters, who often play an outsized role in choosing presidential candidates.
Collins has raised more than $7 million for his campaign, according to the most recent campaign finance reports, and he received his biggest boost, $25 million, from the Senate Leadership Fund, a national group that supports Republican Senate candidates.
At the start of the 2026 midterm cycle, the Georgia vote was considered one of the tightest in the country and a key element for Republicans trying to maintain their slim majority in the Senate.
The race, however, slowly moved Ossoff’s way. Most public polls give him a sizable lead, including a YouGov poll released last month that put him ahead of Collins by 10 percentage points. The poll, which has a margin of error of 2.7 percentage points, was conducted September 15-18.
Georgia is still considered a key midterm battleground for the Senate, but many Republicans see it slipping away and are focusing on other states, like Texas, Maine, North Carolina and Alaska, to try to maintain control of the Senate.
Each candidate used their closing remarks to attack the other.
Ossoff said Collins, who runs a trucking company started by his father, a former congressman, was misleading about his professional background.
“Mike called himself a trucker,” Ossoff said. “He’s the son of a congressman who inherited a congressional seat.”
Collins had the last word, once again hitting Ossoff for voting on Biden-era policies.
“We still don’t know why Jon Ossoff votes the way he does,” Collins said. “Why he voted against our farmers…why he voted against hard-working Georgians.”
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