Battleground Dem accused of using vulnerable children for campaign credit

Sen. Jon Ossoff, D-Ga., is being accused by Georgia’s top child welfare official of using vulnerable children and the state’s embattled foster care system for campaign credit after releasing a new ad touting his work on the state’s troubled system.

Georgia Division of Family & Children Services (DFCS) Director Candice Broce criticized the new foster care-focused ad released last week as the Georgia Democrat seeks re-election in one of the nation’s most closely watched races. In the ad, titled “Our Kids,” Ossoff highlights “a scathing report” and “yearlong bipartisan investigation” alongside Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., into the Georgia foster care system. 

Ossoff presents his probe and new legislation as part of his record protecting children and holding the system accountable. However, Broce says the Democrat is overstating his role and turning a serious child welfare issue into a political victory lap.

“For five years, I’ve been in the trenches fighting for vulnerable children and foster care reform alongside thousands of DFCS workers. Trust us when we say Jon Ossoff is nowhere to be found,” Broce said in a post on X. “Ossoff didn’t get more funding for DFCS after calling us incompetent and resource-strapped. He didn’t secure more federal support for child advocacy centers despite the State’s requests.”

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Sen. Jon Ossoff, D-Ga., recently released an ad titled ‘Our Kids’ touting his work reforming mismanagement and neglect in his state’s foster care system. (Getty Images)

“He didn’t fix federal law putting group homes out of business,” she continued. “He hasn’t streamlined adoptions for kids placed with loving families. Jon’s ad sounds great, but his words are meaningless to the men and women in the arena.”

Ossoff’s team fired back, however, calling Broce an “unqualified partisan political hack” and accusing her of “dangerous incompetence.” They pointed to Ossoff’s oversight work highlighted in the advertisement that Broce criticizes, which the spokesperson said found children in Georgia’s foster care system were likely sex trafficked while in state care, among other issues. 

“The Office of the Child Advocate, juvenile court judges, former foster children, nonpartisan advocates, investigative reporting, and Senator Ossoff’s yearlong investigation have laid bare the deep and dangerous dysfunction at DFCS,” an Ossoff campaign spokesperson told Fox News Digital.

The campaign also cited testimony from juvenile court judges who accused Broce of suggesting that children with special needs be held in juvenile detention while DFCS searched for placements. Broce has denied the allegations, describing them as politically motivated and arguing they distort a broader discussion about how to keep foster youth with complex behavioral issues, runaway histories and trafficking risks safe amid placement shortages.

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Candice L. Broce (left) is the Director of the Georgia Division of Family & Children Services (DFCS). She is pictured next to an image of baby strollers in an office. (Georgia DFCS/Getty Images)

“Candice Broce is a partisan political hack irresponsibly placed in charge of care for the state’s most vulnerable kids,” the Ossoff spokesperson said. “Instead of whining that her dangerous incompetence was made public, she should fix her broken agency.”

Broce rejected the attacks on her qualifications, pointing to her background as a health care attorney, former chief deputy executive counsel and chief operating officer to Gov. Brian Kemp, and saying roughly 40 state agencies, including DFCS, reported to her in that role. 

At the same time, she did not dispute that Georgia’s foster care system has faced serious challenges, but argued Ossoff used those problems for hearings, reports and campaign messaging without delivering meaningful help to fix them.

“If you’re going to beat us down, show up with something to make it better,” Broce said. “He didn’t do that.” 

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Broce said Ossoff could have used his federal role to pursue resources on Medicaid, behavioral health access and placement capacity, rather than simply spotlighting DFCS failures.

“What’s actually bipartisan is the over $100 million in state funds we’ve gotten from Republican and Democrat legislators who support the issues we’re tackling and believe we deserve more resources,” Broce said. “If he decides today that he actually wants to help us and vulnerable Georgia kids, we’d welcome him with open arms.”

Georgia Democratic Senate candidate U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock, D-Ga, (right) and Sen. Jon Ossoff, D-Ga., (left) wave to students before speaking at a Dawgs for Warnock rally at the University of Georgia December 4, 2022 in Athens, Georgia. (Win McNamee/Getty Images)

However, Ossoff’s team contests it is not even “Senator Ossoff’s job to fix the state agency [Broce] leads” in the first place, and said Broce was whining that “it’s Senator Ossoff’s job to fix the state agency she leads.”  

“While Sen. Ossoff led oversight, passed an anti-trafficking law, and helped save foster care funding President Trump cut, unqualified partisan hack Broce whines it’s Senator Ossoff’s job to fix the state agency she leads,” Ossoff’s representatives told Fox News Digital.

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Broce’s criticism of Ossoff included a contrast between his record and that of Georgia’s other U.S. Senator, Democrat Raphael Warnock. Broce called the difference “stark,” pointing to Warnock’s community events for vulnerable mothers and children and adoption-related measures as examples of practical support she says Ossoff has not delivered.

“Compare his child welfare record to Warnock’s. It’s crystal clear which U.S. Senator from Georgia cares about vulnerable families and kids, and it’s not Jon,” Broce said in her X post.

Ossoff, who ran unopposed for the Democratic nomination, is seeking a second term in November against Rep. Mike Collins, R-Ga., who won the Republican nomination after defeating former football coach Derek Dooley in a mid-June GOP runoff election. Warnock will not face reelection again until 2028.