ATLANTA (AP) — A state lawmaker, a retired educator and a conservative talk radio host are vying for the Republican nomination for a newly created congressional seat in north Georgia.

Not surprisingly in one of Georgia's most conservative districts, state Rep. Doug Collins, retired principal Roger Fitzpatrick and radio host and pundit Martha Zoller are campaigning on a conservative party line. For example, they support taxing what people spend, not what they earn. They oppose abortion, except when the life of the mother is threatened. They say government needs to sharply reduce its spending.

To draw distinctions among themselves, they have focused either on their experience as political insiders or outsiders during their numerous debates, forums and interviews ahead of the July 31 primary. The Republican nominee will face Democrat Jody Cooley in November's general election.

In terms of campaign funds, Collins had the most in the bank, nearly $143,000, at the end of March, while Zoller had almost $35,000. Financial information for Fitzpatrick was not available.

A state representative for six years, Collins is a Southern Baptist minister, lawyer and chaplain in the U.S. Air Force Reserves who has the endorsement of the National Rifle Association.

"We've actually had six years of a very conservative record in Georgia," Collins said. "I'm the only one who can say I voted for a tax cut."

A floor leader under Republican Gov. Nathan Deal, Collins was responsible for shepherding Deal's legislation through the General Assembly. Deal and legislative leaders such as Collins were able to build a bipartisan consensus for making deep cuts to the HOPE scholarship program. It was a move intended to keep the struggling scholarship program afloat, but also a difficult political position given the program's popularity with voters. Under the changes, only the highest-scoring students get full scholarships and others receive 90 percent of tuition at state schools.

"This is still the most valuable scholarship program there is in the country," Collins said in an interview.

He said his experience changing the program shows that lawmakers can compromise without abandoning core conservative principles.

"It was a matter of saying, what can we come together and agree on and move this legislation forward," Collins said.

He also co-sponsored legislation that now bans abortions five months after conception. The law makes exceptions for pregnancies that threaten the life or health of the mother or when doctors diagnose the fetus with a fatal defect.

"I think Doug has the experience, and of course Martha uses that against him," said Jim Pilgrim, a Collins supporter and former chairman of the Hall County GOP.

Collins' connections to Deal prompted a mention in a 2010 report by the Office of Congressional Ethics, which was looking into whether Deal broke House ethics rules while serving in Congress. The subject was a meeting in which Collins, Deal and Deal's chief of staff met with then-Revenue Commissioner Bart Graham about an inspection program that benefited Deal's auto salvage company.

Graham, who wanted to open the program to more competition, told investigators Collins "hotboxed" him and treated him like a "witness under cross-examination." Collins in a recent interview disputed that account, saying the conversation was civil and he did nothing wrong. The ethics investigation was later dropped after Deal left office to run for governor.

Collins' nearest competitor is Martha Zoller, who hosted a conservative talk radio show on WXKT-FM until resigning in May to run for office. A favorite of some tea party leaders, Zoller has never held office and argues the district needs an outsider. Instead of political experience, Zoller said she has credentials in business through her radio work and helping run her husband's medical practice.

"Congress is full of state legislators who have balanced budgets while they've been in the state legislature but haven't voted for a single balanced budget or presented a single balanced budget since they've been in Congress," she said. "So I would ask anybody who thinks that you've got to have legislative experience to be able to go to Congress, is 'How is that working out for you?' It's not working out well for us."

Her supporters include former Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain, who donated $2,000 to Zoller's campaign, and Debbie Dooley, co-founder of the Atlanta Tea Party Patriots.

"Washington D.C. has disconnected from what we stand for, and we have got to take it back from the outside, and sending people like Martha to Washington is one of the ways we do that," Cain said in a statement distributed by Zoller's campaign.

The candidates differ slightly in federal immigration policy. Collins emphasizes the need for a national system that would discourage illegal immigrants from obtaining jobs, which he said would help deter illegal immigration in the first place. Zoller is quicker to emphasize securing the U.S. border using physical fences and other technology to detect and track intruders. She also said the country needs a new visa that allows immigrants to cross into the United States to work but does not offer a path to citizenship.

The third candidate, Roger Fitzpatrick, has raised the least money and is running because he said he wants the reach of the federal government significantly trimmed. He supports eliminating the U.S. Department of Education, the Department of Energy and Environmental Protection Agency.

"I am more constitutionally conservative than the other two candidates," he said. "We need to return to the principals our founding fathers instituted in founding our government."

Unlike Collins or Zoller who want to replace President Barack Obama's health care overhaul with other GOP-led plans, Fitzpatrick said it should be repealed and replaced by nothing on the federal level. He said the issue should be addressed by state governments.

"The founding fathers were very plain in that the powers given to the federal government were very specific and well-defined," he said. "And health care was not one of them."