Georgia · U.S. Senate · November 3, 2026

How Mike Collins wins.

Ossoff starts 8.3 points ahead on our starting line from 2026 polls. Campaign work gets Collins within 2,157 votes; a 0.1-point shift in the national mood finishes it. The most net votes are in Fulton County, Cobb County and Gwinnett County.

331,513

net votes between Collins and a win

days to election day. Advance voting opens October 13.

8.3 pts

Ossoff lead, our starting line from 2026 polls

In short

One-page brief ›All Georgia races ranked ›

Collins gets within 2,157 votes on campaign work alone. A 0.1-point national shift finishes it.

Odds today5%

Odds with the plan49%

Net votes to find331,513

WhereFulton County, Cobb County, Gwinnett County

Underdog UpdateSeptember 26, 2026. Underdog plan published. Starting line: Ossoff +8.3. Mike Collins needs 331,513 net votes. Odds 5% today, 49% with the plan.

The number

1,986,174 votes.

That is half of the 3,972,346 ballots we expect in this race, plus one. Where Collins stands today, and what is missing:

1,796,672 Mike Collins baseline

2,128,184 Jon Ossoff baseline

Starting line: Ossoff +8.4 among decided voters, from published 2026 polls, applied to each county's pattern in the 2022 and 2024 official returns. 2026 turnout modeled on 2022, the last midterm.

The odds

5% today. 49% with the plan.

We ran this race 20,000 times with realistic error on every assumption. Drag the slider to see the odds move as the campaign captures more of what history says is available.

Collins wins in

49%

of 20,000 simulated elections

With no plan

How much of what history allows the campaign achieves100%

The plan on this page sits at 100%. Median outcome at this setting: Collins short by 5,705.

Each simulation draws the starting line with an error of 5 points of margin (the starting line comes from 2026 polls) and lets the plan over- or under-deliver by 30 percent. Seeded and reproducible; the method and data are at the bottom of the page.

Three moves

The gap closes three ways.

Change minds. Bring out voters who skip midterms. Win back the third-party vote. Every pool below is counted from official precinct returns and published polls.

Persuade

243K

net votes in the plan, from a pool of 242,998

Who. Ticket splitters and the 8 percent still undecided in the latest poll: 242,998 leaning Ossoff today.

How. Live conversations on the call list that matters: voters who crossed party lines, plus the undecided. Collins needs to win 50 percent of the ones now leaning Ossoff.

Mobilize

78K

net votes in the plan, from a pool of 588,952

Who. At least 588,952 people who voted in 2024 but not in 2022, in counties where Collins's side wins at least 55 percent.

How. Voter ID calls to people who voted in 2024 and skipped 2022, then a ballot chase until each one has voted.

Consolidate

7,976

net votes in the plan, from a pool of 22,788

Who. Voters who went third party in recent races, in the counties that lean Collins's way.

How. A direct appeal to voters who went third party last time. They have already shown they will leave the two-party default.

Together: 329,356 net votes against a gap of 331,513. Still 2,157 short. The rest needs a national shift of about 0.1 points that no campaign controls.

Where it is won

12 counties carry 46% of it.

Ranked by the net votes each one gives the plan. The darker the county, the more of the upset lives there.

Fewer net votesMore net votes for the upset

01
Fulton Countypersuade
Starting line Ossoff +54. 28,130 persuadable voters leaning Ossoff; 120,121 more ballots in 2024 than in 2022.
+28,914
02
Cobb Countypersuade
Starting line Ossoff +23. 21,690 persuadable voters leaning Ossoff; 92,928 more ballots in 2024 than in 2022.
+22,907
03
Gwinnett Countypersuade
Starting line Ossoff +27. 19,513 persuadable voters leaning Ossoff; 124,927 more ballots in 2024 than in 2022.
+20,392
04
DeKalb Countypersuade
Starting line Ossoff +76. 17,492 persuadable voters leaning Ossoff; 71,028 more ballots in 2024 than in 2022.
+17,677
05
Cherokee Countypersuade
Starting line Collins +31. 8,161 persuadable voters leaning Ossoff; 42,821 more ballots in 2024 than in 2022.
+12,726
06
Forsyth Countypersuade
Starting line Collins +26. 7,449 persuadable voters leaning Ossoff; 36,599 more ballots in 2024 than in 2022.
+10,610
07
Hall Countypersuade
Starting line Collins +37. 4,850 persuadable voters leaning Ossoff; 29,045 more ballots in 2024 than in 2022.
+8,324
08
Chatham Countypersuade
Starting line Ossoff +27. 6,654 persuadable voters leaning Ossoff; 35,738 more ballots in 2024 than in 2022.
+7,379
09
Coweta Countypersuade
Starting line Collins +26. 4,072 persuadable voters leaning Ossoff; 22,710 more ballots in 2024 than in 2022.
+6,234
10
Henry Countypersuade
Starting line Ossoff +38. 5,271 persuadable voters leaning Ossoff; 34,627 more ballots in 2024 than in 2022.
+5,736
11
Columbia Countypersuade
Starting line Collins +18. 3,983 persuadable voters leaning Ossoff; 21,896 more ballots in 2024 than in 2022.
+5,636
12
Paulding Countypersuade
Starting line Collins +16. 3,988 persuadable voters leaning Ossoff; 28,769 more ballots in 2024 than in 2022.
+5,402

What the numbers say that the polls do not

The hidden path.

Fulton County holds the biggest share of the plan.

Fulton County gives this plan more net votes than any other county: 28,914. It sits at Ossoff +54 on our starting line.

Cherokee County is a turnout race.

In the precincts Collins's side carries in Cherokee County, bringing back people who voted in 2024 and skipped the 2022 midterm nets 4,106 votes in this plan.

Spend it where it counts.

As of June 30, 2026, Ossoff had $42.59 million in cash on hand to Collins's $2.08 million. That is exactly why the plan puts every dollar on the few places listed here instead of the whole map.

The evidence

Where voters cross over.

Every dot is a precinct. If no one split a ticket, every dot would sit on the line. The orange ones are where Collins's side lost voters it won further up the ballot.

Precincts: 2,718
Slope: 0.983
R²: 0.994
Residual SD: 4.1 pts
Crossover precincts: 366

Weighted least squares, one point per precinct, weighted by ballots cast. Orange precincts sit more than one residual standard deviation below the line: Collins's side did worse there in this race than the top of the ticket predicts. Hover any dot for the precinct.

The next 37 days

Voting starts October 13.

Now to October 5
Find them
Voter ID calls across the persuasion list in these counties. Every conversation tags the voter: with Collins, with Ossoff, or undecided. The undecided become the persuasion universe; the supporters become the ballot chase list.
October 6 to 12
Persuade
Second conversations with every undecided and soft voter, built around the one issue they named on the first call. The goal is 242,998 net votes from people who have crossed party lines before.
October 13 to 23
Bank the ballots
Advance in-person voting runs October 13 through October 30, and absentee ballots start going out October 5. Absentee ballots must be received by 7 p.m. on November 3. Chase every supporter's mail ballot request until it is returned, and move supporters to early voting while it is open.
October 24 to November 2
Turn them out
The drop-off voters: people who voted in 2024 and skipped 2022. At least 588,952 of them live where Collins is favored. Absentee ballots must be received by the county election office by 7 p.m. on November 3. Applications must be received by October 23.
November 3
Election day
Polls are open 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. and photo ID is required. Georgia has no same-day registration. A candidate needs a majority; if no one reaches 50 percent plus one, the top two meet in a December 1 runoff. The last calls go to identified supporters who have not voted, with their polling place in hand.

What has to be true

No wishful thinking.

Official results statewide: Trump carried the 2024 presidential race by 2.2 points; Warnock carried the 2022 U.S. Senate race by 1.0 points; Kemp carried the 2022 governor's race by 7.5 points.

Collins wins 50 percent of the ticket splitters and undecided voters now leaning Ossoff.
In the precincts Collins's side carries in Cherokee County and Hall County, 35 percent of the people who voted in 2024 but skipped 2022 come back and vote.
The national environment moves about 0.1 points toward Collins's side between now and November 3.
The starting line comes from published 2026 polls, including campaign or party sponsored polls where those are the only ones; if the true gap is different, so is the plan.

The work

119,069 conversations.

That is how many live voter conversations this plan takes: about 2,272,313 dials to 757,438 households, before the last ballot is cast.

757K

households on the target list

2,272K

dials across three attempts

119K

live conversations: persuasion, voter ID, ballot chase

Call list: every ticket splitter and undecided voter in the targeted places (you cannot tell which way they lean before the call), every targeted drop-off voter, and the reachable third-party voters. About 69 households for every 100 voters on the list, three attempts each, and a 5.24 percent live answer rate per attempt, the per-program average across 1.2 million real 2026 dials in our published benchmarks.

HyperPhonebank

We run this list.

Calls are the voter ID and ballot chase engine of this plan. They find the persuadable voters and the supporters, so every other dollar lands on the right door. The full call program for this list is an estimated $208,220 at our published rates: 757,438 households, three attempts each.

Professional live callers working exactly these precincts: persuasion on the ticket splitters, voter ID on the fence, ballot chase on every absentee request until it is returned. A live dashboard shows every conversation as it happens. Days to launch, not weeks.

Run this plan How HyperPhonebank works ›Size your own program ›

The candidates

Who is on the ballot.

Underdog

Mike Collins (R)

U.S. representative for Georgia's 10th district since 2023, who founded a trucking company with his wife, Leigh Ann, in the early 1990s and served as chairman of the board of a Georgia credit union and president of his local chamber of commerce. A Jackson, Georgia, native, he earned a bachelor's degree in business administration from Georgia State University in 1990.

Cash on hand $2,079,981 and $6,679,350 raised since January 1, 2025, per FEC reports through June 30, 2026.

Campaign site ›FEC filings ›Wikipedia ›

Favorite · incumbent

Jon Ossoff (D)

U.S. senator from Georgia since 2021, previously a national security staffer and legislative assistant for U.S. Rep. Hank Johnson (2007 to 2012) and managing director and CEO of the investigative documentary company Insight TWI (2013 to 2021). Raised in metro Atlanta, he holds a bachelor's degree from Georgetown University's Walsh School of Foreign Service and a master's in international political economy from the London School of Economics.

Cash on hand $42,587,451 and $77,279,766 raised since January 1, 2025, per FEC reports through June 30, 2026.

Campaign site ›FEC filings ›Wikipedia ›

Also on the ballot

Elbert "Al" Bartell (Ind)

U.S. Air Force veteran (1973 to 1980) and policy analyst and management consultant, born in Hagerstown, Maryland. He earned a bachelor's degree from Saint Leo University in 1984.

Campaign site ›FEC filings ›

Also on the ballot

Christina Loren Clement (Rep)

Describes herself as a mentor, community healer and policy architect focused on economic restoration for historically excluded communities (Ballotpedia candidate survey).

FEC filings ›

Also on the ballot

Cassandra Easton (Wri)

Underdog Updates

What changed, and when.

We re-run this race as new polls, fundraising reports and early vote counts arrive. Every change to the numbers is logged here.

September 26, 2026
Underdog plan published
Starting line: Ossoff +8.3. Mike Collins needs 331,513 net votes. Odds 5% today, 49% with the plan.

Questions

Can Mike Collins win the U.S. Senate race in Georgia in 2026?

Only with help from the national environment. Campaign work can move about 329,356 net votes; the gap is 331,513. The rest would take a 0.1-point national shift.

Where are the votes Mike Collins needs?

Ranked by net votes in the plan: Fulton County, Cobb County, Gwinnett County, DeKalb County, Cherokee County. Persuadable voters are counted from ticket splitting in 2022 and 2024 official returns; turnout targets are people who voted in 2024 and skipped 2022.

How many voters does Mike Collins need to persuade?

About 121,499 voters who lean Jon Ossoff today, each worth two votes of margin when they switch. That is 50 percent of the 242,998 persuadable voters leaning Jon Ossoff.

When does early voting start in Georgia in 2026?

Advance in-person voting in Georgia runs October 13 through October 30, 2026. The registration deadline is October 5, absentee ballot applications must be received by October 23, and absentee ballots must be received by 7 p.m. on Election Day. Georgia requires a majority to win; if no candidate reaches 50 percent plus one, the top two meet in a runoff on December 1.

Who made this analysis?

The Political Group, an independent campaign services firm, from official Georgia Secretary of State precinct returns, Census data, FEC filings and published polls. It is not affiliated with any candidate or party.

Method and sources

Precinct math from official Georgia Secretary of State returns for 2022 and 2024, projected onto current district lines. Polls, ratings and fundraising as published on the dates shown. This is independent analysis by The Political Group, as of September 26, 2026. It is not affiliated with or endorsed by any candidate or party, and it is written for every campaign that starts behind.

Statistics: a weighted least squares crossover regression on every precinct, and 20,000 seeded Monte Carlo simulations. The baseline error (5 points of margin) and plan efficacy spread (30 percent) are our stated assumptions. Download the precinct data (CSV, ready for JASP). Free to cite under CC BY 4.0 with a link to this page.