Fact Check
Reporting has tied Republican Senate nominee Mike Collins to a son-in-law who has posted white nationalist and antisemitic content online. Here's what's documented, how close the ties are, and exactly what Collins has and hasn't said about it.
This is about a family member, not Mike Collins' own statements. Nothing here reports Collins himself making white nationalist or antisemitic remarks. The posts below are attributed to David Alan Scheer II, who is married to Collins' daughter.
Collins, a U.S. representative, is the Republican nominee challenging Sen. Jon Ossoff in Georgia's 2026 Senate race.
Scheer has posted white nationalist and antisemitic content online.
TrueCNN's KFile unit reported this on July 16, 2026, based on a review of Scheer's own accounts. Scheer is an online influencer with more than 1.5 million followers across Instagram, TikTok, YouTube and Telegram. The Georgia Recorder independently reviewed his posts and confirmed the pattern. Below is what's actually documented, item by item, not a summary or a characterization.
The confirmed statements, one by one
True: in his own words, on his own accountsEvery item above is Scheer's own words or his own repost, reviewed directly by reporters at CNN and the Georgia Recorder. None of it has been reported as edited, faked, or taken out of context, and Scheer has not disputed the reporting; he did not respond to requests for comment from either outlet.
Scheer is closely connected to Collins, not a distant in-law.
TrueCNN's review found Scheer has produced promotional material for Collins' private trucking company, has appeared in Collins' campaign photos, and attended Collins' Senate primary runoff victory party.
He also appears to live on Collins' property. CNN found Scheer has been registered to vote since 2024 at a house Collins owns, next door to the congressman's own home, and identified several of Scheer's videos that appear to have been filmed on or near that property. That means the white nationalist content in the section above wasn't posted from some unrelated address; some of it, according to CNN's review, was filmed steps from where Collins himself lives.
Has Collins himself interacted with Scheer's white nationalist content?
Not establishedNo. Nothing in the reporting shows Collins liking, sharing, commenting on, or otherwise engaging online with Scheer's specific posts. What's documented is proximity, not interaction: family ties, the shared property, the trucking company work, and appearing together at campaign events and in campaign photos. That's a real and close relationship, but it's a different thing than Collins engaging with the content itself, and no outlet has reported the latter.
Collins' own record, separate from Scheer
True: two confirmed incidents, both from 2024These are Collins' own posts, not his son-in-law's, and both predate the Scheer story by more than a year.
March 2024: An X account called "GarbageHuman," known for racist and antisemitic posts, shared an article criticizing Washington Post reporter Maura Judkis in a way that signaled she is Jewish. Collins replied, "Never was a second thought." After backlash from Jewish state lawmakers, Collins didn't apologize; he said he was endorsing the article's criticism of Judkis, not her religion, and that critics were reading things into it that weren't there.
May 2024: Collins reposted a video of a pro-Palestinian demonstration at Ole Miss in which white counterprotesters can be seen and heard imitating a monkey at a Black demonstrator, captioning it "Ole Miss taking care of business." After backlash, he wrote that he hadn't intended to highlight that behavior and didn't think anyone should "glorify" it. (Collins has no personal tie to Ole Miss; he's a Georgia State University graduate. He was praising the counterprotesters shown, not his own school.)
What about his wife or his other children?
No reporting foundWe found no news coverage of Collins' wife, Leigh Ann Collins, making racist or antisemitic statements, or of his other children. The one claim involving a family member besides Scheer is the antisemitic infographic Scheer posted and said his wife, Collins' daughter, had made. That claim comes from Scheer himself, in his own caption; no reporter has independently confirmed she made it, and she hasn't been reported making any public statement of her own on any of this.
Collins paid his son-in-law for work at his trucking company.
Unconfirmed, because Collins won't sayWhat's confirmed: Scheer produced and narrated promotional videos for Collins' trucking company. In one social media post, filmed in front of company trucks, Scheer said he was making the videos for a "client."
What's not confirmed: any dollar amount, an employment or contractor relationship, or an actual payment. No invoice, FEC filing, or company record showing money changed hands has been made public.
CNN's Andrew Kaczynski, who broke the story, said his team asked Collins' campaign directly: does Scheer have a role in the campaign, has he filmed content on Collins' property, and has he worked for Collins' company "as an employee, contractor, or any capacity." The campaign didn't answer any of those questions, and also didn't address the specific white nationalist remarks or the antisemitic infographic when CNN asked about them directly.
Sen. Ossoff has since put the same questions to Collins repeatedly and publicly, including on a July 23 press call and an August 3 video titled "No Answers." As of this writing, Collins still hasn't answered them. His only public comments say Scheer "has had no role in my campaign whatsoever," which addresses the campaign, not the trucking company, and isn't the same as saying no money was ever paid.
Collins hasn't spoken against it.
Half true, and now out of dateThis was accurate for about three weeks. Here's the full timeline:
July 16, 2026
The day CNN's report ran, a Collins campaign spokesperson responded only about Collins' own record: "Rep. Collins' lifelong support for Israel is unquestionable and backed by his consistent record in Congress of standing up for Israel and her people." The statement didn't mention Scheer or his posts.
About a week later
Asked directly by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Collins said, "Nobody speaks for me, and I don't speak for anybody else," and pointed to his voting record on Israel when asked about antisemitism.
July 30, 2026
At a news conference in Monroe County, reporters asked Collins directly about Scheer's posts. Collins didn't answer, pivoted to attacking Ossoff, then ended the press conference without taking further questions on the subject.
August 3, 2026
Collins issued a fuller statement: "I've repeatedly said nobody speaks for me; I only speak for myself... [Scheer] has had no role in my campaign whatsoever, and I don't believe or support those views and I have always condemned racism and antisemitism regardless of the source."
So as of August 3, Collins has condemned racism and antisemitism in general terms and said Scheer has no role in his campaign. What the record still doesn't show him doing: naming Scheer or addressing his specific statements one by one, answering the payment question above, releasing the communications Sen. Ossoff has publicly asked for, or apologizing.
He doesn't control his son-in-law's views, has never shared them, and has consistently opposed racism and antisemitism. The race, he says, should be about his record in Congress.
The financial and campaign ties are too close to treat this as a distant family embarrassment. They want specific answers: did Collins or his business pay Scheer, and will he release related communications.
What Scheer posted, and how closely he's tied to Collins' campaign and trucking company, is well documented, drawn directly from his own social media accounts by CNN's KFile unit.
Whether Collins has "spoken against it" depends on when you're asking. For about three weeks he avoided the subject and ended a press conference over it. On August 3 he issued a general condemnation of racism and antisemitism and said Scheer has no campaign role, without naming Scheer, addressing his specific statements, or answering the financial questions Ossoff has raised.
Last updated August 13, 2026, reflecting Collins' August 3 statement and reporting through August 11. If Collins or his campaign says more, or answers the questions still outstanding, we'll update this page. If you spot something we got wrong, tell us and we'll correct it here.