With the entry this week of Derek Dooley, a friend of Gov. Brian Kemp who hails from college football royalty in Georgia, the Republican field in the Georgia Senate race is taking shape.

Dooley, whose father coached the Georgia Bulldogs and who spent several years leading the rival Tennessee Volunteers, announced Monday that he’d be running against Reps. Buddy Carter (R-GA) and Mike Collins (R-GA) in the Republican primary to take on Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-GA), Republicans’ top-targeted incumbent.

Kemp, a popular Republican governor, was seen as Republicans’ best chance of ousting Ossoff. Some prominent Jewish former Ossoff donors in the state reached out to Kemp late last year urging him to run against Ossoff, frustrated by the senator’s votes last year to block some weapons transfers to Israel. But Kemp ultimately passed on the race. Ossoff has worked to rebuild trust with disaffected Jewish voters, but those efforts were hampered by his vote last week to block a shipment of assault weapons to Israel.

Kemp has family ties to Dooley, who has brought on top Kemp advisors, is likely to receive the governor’s backing and pursue a center-right lane in the race, while portraying himself as a political outsider. All the candidates have been making the pivotal pitch for President Donald Trump’s backing in the race and tying themselves closely to him, hoping that key endorsement will help them clear the field.

With Kemp’s help, Dooley could potentially peel off support from moderate Jewish Democrats still frustrated by Ossoff, though Jewish leaders in the state told Jewish Insider last week that they’re not yet making any commitments in the race. They say they’re waiting to see who emerges from the Republican primary and how Ossoff’s record shapes up over the coming months before they decide whether to support the incumbent next November.

Dooley, for his part, is wasting little time in courting their votes.

“I stand with our ally Israel and firmly believe they should have the necessary resources to defend themselves against terrorists,” Dooley said in a statement to JI. “While Jon Ossoff continues to vote against Israel and American national security interests, I will be a leading voice for a strong America and a strong Israel in the Senate.”

Emanuel Fialkow, a prominent conservative member of Georgia’s Jewish community, said that Kemp’s team connected him to Dooley and the two spoke at length on a variety of issues, including antisemitism and Israel. Fialkow said he was previously part of a group of Jewish donors who urged Kemp to run against Ossoff.

Fialkow said that Dooley had asked him about a range of issues including Israel policy, the war in Gaza and antisemitism, and that he subsequently agreed to help Dooley develop an Israel position paper, which Fialkow described as very strongly pro-Israel. He said that Dooley “will have a backbone” in support of Israel.

He subsequently organized a lunch meeting at his home to introduce Dooley to a small group of others in the state, many of them Jewish, including both traditional Republicans and Democrats. Fialkow said that the group discussed a range of issues and came away seeing Dooley as honest, humble, inspiring, engaging and curious to learn more. He praised Dooley as a proven leader and a “really good guy” who can speak to people from a range of backgrounds, and is interested in listening to and learning from people.

He said other Jewish leaders in the Atlanta area are also in discussions with and about supporting Dooley. Others said they haven’t been in touch with Dooley or his surrogates yet.

Fialkow said that he and some other Jewish leaders in the state see Ossoff’s relationship with them as broken beyond repair, and said they can’t trust him going forward to be a reliable supporter of Israel. He argued that Dooley is the “only chance” for Zionist voters who put support for Israel first. 

Ossoff, for his part, maintains some vocal supporters in the Jewish community.

Cary Levow, a supporter of pro-Israel causes and candidates, told JI last week, “I support Senator Ossoff and know of other Jewish Georgians who understand that Jon’s approach to the Gaza humanitarian issue is genuine.” 

“Senator Ossoff has voted for over $20 billion in aid to Israel, has family living in Israel and has spent a significant amount of time in the country,” Levow continued. “I think Jon has represented the Jewish community well and I have zero concern about a senator who is critical of how [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu] Bibi is waging this war.”

Fialkow argued that the only way for a Republican to win is for both Kemp and Trump to be aligned behind the same candidate, and that a hard-right Republican can’t win statewide in Georgia, meaning that Dooley gives Republicans their best chance to beat Ossoff.

Fialkow said he’s spoken to Collins and is confident that he would never vote against U.S. support for Israel, due to his own religious convictions. Collins has voiced the same view in confrontations with anti-Israel activists.

Speaking at an Oct. 7 memorial ceremony in 2024, Collins called the U.S. Israel’s “greatest friend” and said that the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attacks had only strengthened the relationship between the two partners. He said he would work to make sure Israel receives all the support it needs to defend itself.

“Hamas not only attacked the peaceful people of Israel that day, but they launched an assault against the idea of free and fair democracies in the Middle East,” Collins said.

But some elements of Collins’ record on antisemitism could raise red flags for others in the Jewish community. Last year, he refused to apologize for and doubled down on engaging with an antisemitic, racist Twitter account that was attacking a reporter for being Jewish. And he voted against the Antisemitism Awareness Act, and has a record of engaging in otherwise extremist rhetoric online. 

“Mike Collins has condemned the hate speech seen on college campuses and around the globe, and has been an ardent supporter of Israel in Congress. While Jon Ossoff capitulated to woke activists and voted to cut aid to Israel, Mike Collins has stood strong and protected its right to exist,” a Collins campaign spokesperson told JI, when asked about his online history and vote on the antisemitism bill.

Carter, who is close with some Atlanta-area Jewish leaders, has been a vocal supporter of pro-Israel and Jewish causes in the House, including leading pushes for funding and support for Holocaust education programs, calling on colleagues to address antisemitism in health care, leading legislation to support U.S.-Israel cooperative programs, urging support for the snapback of U.N. sanctions on Iran and calling for Qatar and Turkey to expel Hamas leaders. He also supported the Antisemitism Awareness Act, unlike Collins.

Carter’s campaign did not respond to a request for comment.

Other than Collins’ vote against the Antisemitism Awareness Act, both Carter and Collins have records of supporting legislation backing Israel and combating antisemitism, including voting for supplemental aid to Israel and a resolution describing anti-Zionism as antisemitic.