Red flags piling up for Georgia Republicans heading into 2026 midterms
On Wednesday morning, Republicans in Georgia got an urgent message from an unlikely source, state Insurance Commissioner John King.
The usually low-key King posted a lengthy statement to social media, almost a manifesto, after Democrats managed to flip a Republican state House seat in Oconee and Clarke counties. That unexpected special election loss followed two 26-point Democratic routs in November for a pair of statewide Public Service Commission seats, which Georgia Republicans have dominated for decades.
The PSC upsets came after a different September special election to fill former state GOP Sen. Brandon Beach’s seat representing portions of Cherokee and Fulton counties. Although Republican newcomer Jason Dickerson won the race, he finished about 10 percentage points behind what Beach had won the year before.
“Georgia Republicans, we have a problem,” King wrote. He described unmotivated GOP donors, unmotivated Republican base voters and a muddled party message that put other issues ahead of people’s difficult economic realities. Unless the party changes course, he warned, Republicans will be outraised, outspent and defeated next year, too.
“Everyone behind the scenes knows it, even if hardly anyone is willing to say it publicly,” King wrote.
King, who was appointed to his position by Gov. Brian Kemp, is considered a consummate team player at the Capitol. But he’s also on the statewide ballot in 2026. As his statement ricocheted around GOP circles this week, fellow Republicans reached out to thank him for speaking up. “Somebody had to say something,” one said.
Georgia GOP Chairman Josh McKoon was not among the naysayers after the Democratic flips. Instead, he said the PSC losses were mostly explained by the timing of the races, which overlapped with off-year city elections that naturally turned out more Democrats. And he said he expects the Athens-area House seat to flip back to Republicans in 2026 when the GOP has its full turnout operation running.
“These (off-year) elections don’t have any predictive value,” he said.
But Georgia Republicans’ challenges are mounting outside of the seats that Democrats recently picked up. One is a communications vacuum being created at the state level as Kemp enters his last year in office and the state’s next top three Republicans — Lt. Gov. Burt Jones, Attorney General Chris Carr and Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger — face off in a primary race to replace the outgoing governor. Although each one has put affordability at the top of their list of issues, they’re all, literally, competing against each other, including on messaging.
President Donald Trump’s own message operation in Washington isn’t helping much. In response to recent questions about Americans’ ongoing cost of living concerns, Trump called affordability a “Democrat hoax.”
At a Pennsylvania rally this week meant to focus on the issue, Trump instead told the audience the economy is “roaring” and “the hottest in the world.”
“You’re doing better than you’ve ever done!” he said.
McKoon said he hopes Trump will campaign in Georgia, too, in 2026 when he can talk up his tax cuts and economic record. “The president has a good story to tell,” he said.
But Democratic Party of Georgia Chair Charlie Bailey called Trump’s comments about the economy lately “insulting and idiotic.”
Bailey was at the forefront of Democrats’ strategy this year to push a single message of affordability in the PSC races and to use the turnout of those statewide contests to identify areas like the Oconee-based House district that could be promising for Democrats.
“This isn’t rocket science. If you do things that hurt folks and make it harder for people to achieve the American dream, they might have a bad reaction to that. And that’s what we’re seeing in Georgia,” he said.
It‘s important to also say that Democrats have their own challenges ahead, including Republicans’ decades of statewide power and Democrats crowded field for governor, which could produce a nominee who weighs the whole ticket down.
A final red flag for Georgia Republicans heading into 2026 has come courtesy of U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, who unexpectedly resigned her seat in Congress after a bitter split with Trump, who called her a “traitor” and a “lunatic.”
Greene will certainly be replaced by a Republican in the conservative 14th Congressional District. But her decision to quit came after speaking up about her own constituents’ anxieties — a looming jump in premiums for the Affordable Care Act, the secrecy of the White House regarding the Jeffrey Epstein sex abuse files, and their struggles to keep up with the galloping cost of living in Georgia.
Given Greene’s excommunication by Trump for speaking her mind, don’t expect many more Republicans to be so frank if they’re looking for a Trump endorsement in 2026.
And that gets us back to King, who had hoped to run for Senate in 2026 but dropped out when he quickly realized he would not have the endorsement of Trump or Kemp in the GOP primary to challenge Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff.
Like Greene, those snubs have given King the freedom to be the Republicans’ very own Paul Revere. He’s basically warning the GOP, “The midterms are coming!”
Only Republicans can decide if they’re willing to listen.
About the Author
Patricia Murphy is the AJC's senior political columnist. She was previously a nationally syndicated columnist for CQ Roll Call, national political reporter for the Daily Beast and Politics Daily, and wrote for The Washington Post and Garden & Gun. She graduated from Vanderbilt and holds a master’s degree in journalism from Columbia University.
