AdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENTYou have a preview view of this article while we are checking your access. When we have confirmed access, the full article content will load.The president has not yet endorsed Representative Mike Collins or Derek Dooley, a former football coach, in the race to challenge the Democratic senator, Jon Ossoff.Listen · 7:48 min Representative Mike Collins, a self-described MAGA loyalist, and Derek Dooley, a close friend of Gov. Brian Kemp, will face each other in a Republican runoff for Senate in Georgia on June 16.Credit...Audra Melton for The New York Times; David Walter Banks for The New York TimesBy Patricia MazzeiReporting from rural Sandersville and suburban Griffin, Ga.June 7, 2026, 5:02 a.m. ETDerek Dooley campaigned in rural Georgia this month with a lifelong friend: Gov. Brian Kemp, who also happens to be the state’s most popular Republican. Yet Mr. Dooley remains, by his own admission, the underdog in the Republican Senate primary runoff.His opponent, Representative Mike Collins, who led after both advanced to a runoff in the first-round election last month, is the race’s self-styled MAGA candidate. President Trump has not endorsed either man ahead of the June 16 runoff — at least not yet.But Mr. Collins told a Republican women’s club in suburban Griffin last week that Georgia’s MAGA crowd has “always known” who’s who. “I’ve been out there all over the country with President Trump,” he said.Trump-aligned candidates have won nearly every time the president has made a primary endorsement this year, but some of those elections occurred in deeply Republican states, including Louisiana and Texas. In Georgia, Republicans face a much more difficult electoral landscape in their bid to unseat Senator Jon Ossoff, the Democratic incumbent, who has banked more than $32 million for the November election. That’s far more than either Republican so far.The stakes are high for Democrats too, who must hold the seat to have any realistic chance of taking control of the Senate.ImageJon Ossoff of Georgia was seen as the most vulnerable Democrat in the Senate at the start of the year but now is viewed as a formidable, well-funded incumbent.Credit...Kendrick Brinson for The New York TimesThank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe.AdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENT