Some of Georgia’s Black conservative voices are calling out Republican U.S. Senate nominee Mike Collins for yet another racist controversy involving a former staffer.
A story about Collins’ leadership political action committee paying $7,700 in 2025 to Carrollton resident Preston Alfonso Parra Mejia Luca Matteo Del Toro for fundraising consultations broke Thursday. Parra, 25, is a social media provocateur. He has posted AI-generated images of himself wearing Ku Klux Klan robes, vulgar references to Black people, and an image of a swastika.
Collins’ campaign hasn’t responded to requests for comment. The candidate is vying against Democratic incumbent Sen. Jon Ossoff in one of the nation’s most high profile midterm races.
Parra is the latest former Collins staffer to be spotlighted for making offensive, racist, or anti-Semitic remarks online. CNN reported in July that Collins’ son-in-law, David Alan Scheer II, is a pro-white nationalist social media influencer who has shared posts on Instagram promoting Patriot Front, a neo-Nazi hate group.
Parra’s rhetoric is being highlighted at a time when Collins and other GOP candidates are trying to make inroads with Black Georgians, who constitute roughly one-third of the battleground state’s electorate. The pro-Trump congressman has consistently trailed Ossoff in the polls. His favorability among Republicans also lags behind that of Republican gubernatorial nominee Rick Jackson, suggesting he is underperforming with his GOP base.
News of his latest scandal was troubling for Mableton resident Michael Murphy, 80, who serves as second vice chair of the Georgia Black Republican Council.
“Most fellow Black Republicans I speak with are leaning towards a split ticket,” Murphy told Capital B Atlanta on Friday. “They’re in support of Rick Jackson, but have not decided or are not excited about candidate Collins.”
Losing support among Black conservatives like Murphy could doom Collins’ chances of winning in November, a reality he acknowledged earlier this month during a campaign stop aimed at Black supporters in East Point.
“We need help,” Collins told the crowd of about 100 Black conservatives.
Radio host Shelley Wynter is the Georgia Black Republican Council board member who endorsed Ossoff in June after Collins won his party’s primary runoff race. Wynter said Collins’ controversies are turning off Republicans as well as independents and Democrats.
He said he learned of the latest controversy after The Washington Post’s story was shared on X by prominent Georgia Republican Debbie Dooley, who is quoted criticizing Collins in the article.
“When you’ve lost Debbie Dooley, you don’t have the base anymore,” Wynter said. “When you have an issue of [political] record, you can turn that around. When it’s a moral issue of the people you surround yourself with, I think that sticks.”
Ossoff, who has repeatedly described Collins as a “known bigot,” referred to his latest scandal as “disgraceful, and disqualifying,” during a press conference Thursday in Macon.
GOP backers have reportedly committed to spending $44 million to support his campaign. Some Black Republican leaders have maintained their support for Collins despite his troubles. Wynter suggested that’s a mistake.
“If African American Republicans are going to make any inroads into the Black community … you have to build credibility within that community,” Wynter said. “You don’t build credibility within that community if you’re going to just vote for the Republican Party simply because it’s the Republican Party. You become no different than Democrats who say, ‘Vote blue no matter who.’”
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