Georgia Insurance Commissioner John King is taking steps to challenge Democratic U.S. Sen. Jon Ossoff if his political ally Gov. Brian Kemp doesn’t enter the race, according to three people with direct knowledge of his conversations.
The Republican has met with several GOP U.S. senators and discussed his potential candidacy with key activists and donors, according to the officials, who requested anonymity because they were unauthorized to discuss King’s private discussions.
King is one of many GOP officials who are awaiting Kemp’s decision on whether to challenge Ossoff in 2026. Senior Republicans see Kemp, who cannot run for reelection, as the party’s strongest possible challenger to the first-term Democrat.
But King, the first Latino elected to statewide office in Georgia, is positioning himself as a backup option if Kemp passes. Other possible GOP contenders include U.S. Reps. Buddy Carter and Rich McCormick and Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger.
The governor appointed King to the insurance post in 2019, and he won a full term three years later.
A native of Mexico, King is a former Atlanta Police Department officer who later became Doraville’s police chief. He is a retired major general in the U.S. Army National Guard who served as a commander in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Iraq and Afghanistan.
Credit: Ben Gray for the AJC
Credit: Ben Gray for the AJC
He’s aligned himself closely with Kemp since his appointment and is a key supporter of the governor’s limited Medicaid expansion program and his 2025 push to curb big jury awards.
Like Kemp, King was also targeted by a GOP challenger recruited by Donald Trump in 2022. And like Kemp, he handily defeated the GOP opponent and has since made amends with the president-elect.
“If Gov. Kemp decides to run for Senate, he’ll have Commissioner King’s full support,” said Scott Rials, a King adviser. “And the commissioner also looks forward to working closely with him to get tort reform done in the legislative session.”
King’s groundwork echoes Carter’s maneuvering ahead of the 2022 campaign against Democratic U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock.
In that election, the Savannah Republican said he would run — but only if Georgia football star Herschel Walker declined to join the race. Walker wound up entering the contest, and Carter stayed on the sidelines.
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