Upstart Democrat Jon Ossoff has tried to make a special election for a longtime Republican congressional seat in Georgia a referendum on President Donald Trump, a proposition that two of the leading GOP contenders have handled differently.

While former Georgia Secretary of State Karen Handel has stressed her own qualifications and background, businessman Bob Gray eagerly has sought to tie his fortunes to the president and said he would benefit in a head-to-head race with Ossoff if Trump becomes the dominant issue. Handel and Gray generally have polled ahead of former Republican state senators Judson Hill and Dan Moody.

“The amount of support now for President Trump is even greater than it was during the presidential election.”

Ossoff, a 30-year-old documentary filmmaker who previously served as a congressional aide, has taken advantage of leftist anger at Trump and a lack of other races across the country to attract a staggering sum of money and Hollywood star power. He has polled well ahead of an exceptionally large and divided field of Republicans hoping to emerge from Tuesday’s election.

Under the election format in Georgia, all candidates regardless of party square off Tuesday, followed by a June runoff between the top two finishers.

Some experts contend that Ossoff’s best shot at pulling off an upset in the Republican-leaning Sixth Congressional District is to crack the 50 percent mark and win outright this week.

“That may be true, but I don’t think he can get there,” said M.V. Hood, director of the Survey Research Center at the University of Georgia.

That is not a firm prediction, Hood added, only an assessment of the difficulty of a single candidate getting more than half of the vote in an 18-person field.

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While Ossoff mostly has consolidated his position on the Left among lesser-known Democrats, Republicans have been distracted by the intense competition among each other. With money pouring in from all over the country, Ossoff has raised almost $8.5 million — the 11th-highest total in the history of House elections.

Actress Alyssa Milano drove voters to the polls during early voting. Comedian Chelsea Handler urged Twitter followers to vote for him, although she incorrectly told followers the election was last Tuesday.

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Republican Stronghold Threatened
The Sixth Congressional District is a GOP stronghold in the Atlanta suburbs, and it has been in Republican hands since Newt Gingrich won it in the 1970s to start a political career that would result in his election as speaker of the House of Representatives.

Former Rep. Tom Price, whose appointment as health and human services secretary created the need for Tuesday’s special election, never broke a sweat during seven elections. But Trump only carried the district by only 1.5 percentage points in the 2016 presidential election. Democrats also are encouraged that an underfunded Democrat came within 8.5 points of winning a special election for a House seat in an overwhelmingly Republican Kansas district.

Gray, who has tried to claim the outsider mantle, seems eager for a faceoff with Ossoff that turns on Trump.

“The amount of support now for President Trump is even greater than it was during the presidential election,” he said.

Handel, meanwhile, presents herself as a conservative with the experience to get things done in Congress. In addition to her tenure as secretary of state, she served as chairwoman of the Fulton County Commission.

“Everyone wants to make everything about President Trump,” she said.

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But Handel argued that she is better qualified than her Republican competitors. And that goes doubly for Ossoff, she said.

“There’s just a stark difference between experience and, you know, background and what Ossoff in bringing to the table,” she said.

Julianne Thompson, a Republican strategist and co-chairwoman of the Atlanta Tea Party, said she believes candidates should focus on their own accomplishments.

“Ultimately, we will see on Tuesday what the right way or wrong way was,” she said.

A lot of conservative money has flowed into the district to counter the buckets of cash that Ossoff has gobbled up. The GOP’s Congressional Leadership Fund, the National Republican Congressional Committee, and the National Rifle Association have launched attack ads against Ossoff. Other conservative groups, though, have trained their fire at Republicans in the field. Club for Growth, for instance, has run ads urging voters to “Stop Handel” because of alleged over-spending.

Gray seconds that sentiment.

“Karen is every definition of a career politician,” he says, parroting the messaging from the D.C.-based group targeting Handel.

Outside Money Pours In
Handel said she is not bothered by the attacks.

“What all these folks say does not define me,” she said. “The big advantage that I have is that the people in this district know me, and they trust me.”

[lz_table title=”Ossoff’s Drive for 50%” source=”Decision Desk HQ”]Polls in Georgia 6th District
|Poll,Dates,Ossoff
Landmark Comm.,4/12-4/13,45%
Opinion Savvy,4/13,42%
Revily,4/10-4/12,45%
RRH Elections,4/5-4/10,39%
Survey USA,3/27-4/2,43%
Lake Research,3/26-3/28,40%
Opinon Savvy,3/22-3/23,39.8%
Clout Research,3/15-3/16,41%
Trafalgar Group,3/2-3/3,18%
Clout Research,2/17-2/18,31.7%
[/lz_table]

Thompson said she wishes conservatives would focus on Ossoff.

“It is a shame that national organizations can’t be on the same page on the importance of keeping the seat,” she said.

Gray and Handel agree on one thing: The GOP will be unified regardless of which Republican gets to face Ossoff in June.

“There will be plenty of time to pivot if I have the privilege of being the Republican candidate in the runoff,” Handel said.

Republican will have plenty of ammunition. Ossoff is young and has been accused of exaggerating his national security credentials. What’s more, he lives outside the district, which is not a legal obstacle but could be a political liability. Republicans also will hit Ossoff over the source of his money — 95 percent of it has come from outside the district and 80 percent outside of Georgia.

The state ranking first as Ossoff’s source of funds is California, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

“A lot of it is coming from Hollywood,” Thompson said.

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An initial Democratic advantage in early voting closed by the end of that three-week period Friday. The 50,000 ballots already cast, according to the Atlanta Constitution-Journal, reflect a nearly dead-even split between voters who participated in the Republican primary last year and those who took the Democratic ballot.

Still, Thompson acknowledged, she initially underestimated Ossoff and urged the GOP not to repeat that mistake.

“He is doing a lot better than I originally though he would,” she said. “It would be a big mistake for Republicans to take this for granted.”