After Hurricane Helene barreled through Georgia in the fall of 2024, Sen. Jon Ossoff was the first high-ranking official on the ground in Valdosta, where he took in the damage and promised locals he’d help them get the federal recovery assistance they needed.
asserted
they → barrel → assistance
“Just about every week, I dial up Georgia mayors and pastors and farmers to find out how I can help,” Ossoff said at a recent campaign rally for his reelection bid against Republican Rep. Mike Collins.
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Ossoff → dial → Collins
Up the Eastern Seaboard, Maine Sen. Susan Collins keeps a regular itinerary of local events, including ribbon-cuttings and groundbreakings for projects she helped finance as Senate Appropriations Committee chair.
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she → keep → chair
“There’s not a community in Maine that can’t say Susan helped us,” intones the voiceover in a campaign ad for Collins.
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voiceover → ’ → Collins
The five-term senator, who’s not related to the Georgia congressman, is facing Democratic former state legislative leader Troy Jackson in November.
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who → relate → November
The two senators — Ossoff the Democrat, Collins the Republican — began this election cycle widely viewed as their respective parties’ most vulnerable members.
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senators → begin → members
But as Republican Donald Trump’s second presidency and partisan fights on Capitol Hill dominate national political conversation, the senators’ campaigns have played out differently than expected in part because of the more mundane part of their jobs: helping the people back home.
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campaigns → dominate → people
“We in the political world tend to think about the strength of incumbency through the lens of fundraising and national media attention, and those do matter,” said Republican Chris Hartline, once a top adviser at the National Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee.
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Hartline → tend → Committee
“But the ability to help the local communities you actually represent still matters.”
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you → help → communities
For Ossoff, it means attracting endorsements from Republican officials, including Valdosta Mayor Scott James Matheson, that have made it harder for Mike Collins to land attacks claiming that the liberal first-term senator from Atlanta doesn’t represent Georgia.
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senator → mean → Georgia
For Susan Collins, it means a go-to buffer argument as she runs with the weight of Trump’s lagging popularity and her support for various parts of his agenda.
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she → mean → agenda
A month from Election Day, Ossoff has gone from a top GOP target to a widely perceived favorite to defend a seat that Democrats cannot afford to lose as they try to regain a Senate majority.
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they → go → majority
And as Republican incumbents like Ohio Sen. Jon Husted are increasingly viewed as underdogs, strategists in both parties still view Susan Collins’ race as a tossup.
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strategists → view → tossup
Ossoff draws begrudging respect from Republicans
Ossoff and his aides say the senator tries to deliver on every aspect of what Washington calls “constituent services.”
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Washington → draw → what
That could mean federal appropriations, disaster assistance or nuts-and-bolts matters like assisting a voter who is seeking Social Security disability benefits or a missing Social Security check.
uncertain
who → mean → benefits
It includes surprise notes of congratulations or condolences to constituents — something Ossoff sends even to aides of Republican elected officials.
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Ossoff → include → officials
Endorsing Ossoff earlier this year, Matheson, the Valdosta mayor, described himself as a lifelong conservative.
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Matheson → endorse → conservative
But he praised Ossoff for his Helene response.
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he → praise → response
The senator recalled “going block by block” with the mayor and serving “hot meals to folks who had just lost their homes.”
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who → recall → homes
Ossoff points to money secured for a dialysis center in nearby Tifton, Georgia.
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Ossoff → point → Tifton
Mayor Julie Smith, another Republican, has endorsed Ossoff, too, explaining that “he’s been very good for south Georgia.”
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he → endorse → Georgia
Courtney Eskew, whose husband, Joshua, was injured during an Army tour in Afghanistan, pointed to Ossoff’s work for veterans’ care.
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husband → injure → care
The couple both grew up in Republican households but said they were volunteering for Ossoff’s campaign.
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they → grow → campaign
“Senator Ossoff has been passionately vocal about VA funding, and any time we’ve needed to call to advocate or to ask a question about benefits, his office has done everything we needed,” Eskew said after the couple attended an Ossoff event.
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couple → need → event
Eskew said it’s a powerful counter to opponent Mike Collins’ attacks that Ossoff is too liberal for the historically conservative state.
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Ossoff → say → state
Ossoff “doesn’t vote the way I want him to vote” on contentious issues, added Chan Jones, who chairs the Georgia Republican Party’s 8th Congressional District committee.
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who → vote → committee
“But as far as the office and the way they’ve carried themselves and handled other aspects of the job, I can’t knock that.”
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I → carry → that
Jones has his own example as a member of the Bleckley County Recreation Board.
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Jones → have → Board
“We were having some trouble with a federal grant,” he said, adding that one call to the senator’s office fixed the issue.
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call → have → issue
Mainers must decide the value of seniority
Susan Collins is relentless in promoting money she’s steered to Maine — for community colleges and hospital expansions or hyperlocal examples like a program to control the spruce budworm, a threat to the state’s forests and timber industry.
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she → decide → forests
“That will go away with a freshman senator,” she said at a Maine manufacturing conference earlier this year.
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she → go → conference
“It took me years to climb the ladder of seniority.”
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It → take → seniority
In late August, she attended a ribbon-cutting ceremony for the rehabilitation of St. Croix Apartments in Calais, a city of about 3,000 residents on the Canadian border, more than 200 miles (320 kilometers) from Portland.
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she → attend → Portland
It’s in a conservative part of the state where GOP candidates need heavy turnout to win statewide.
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candidates → ’ → turnout
Collins was there to highlight $3 million she secured to restore 26 affordable housing units for low-income seniors.
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she → highlight → seniors
“The renovated St. Croix Apartments will provide seniors with safe and affordable homes close to the family, friends and community they love,” Collins said.
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Collins → renovate → family
The amount is a pittance within appropriations bills measured in the billions.
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amount → measure → billions
But it’s the kind of work many Maine residents associate with the veteran lawmaker.
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residents → ’ → lawmaker
In the same campaign stretch, Collins visited a child development center in Bangor to highlight Head Start funding.
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Collins → visit → funding
In the summer, she walked in the Casco Days Grand Parade to raise money for the local fire association and stopped by the dedication of a new fire station in the town of Sweden, population 400.
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she → walk → Sweden
…and 11 more, not listed.
The Aporia
