Former NFL star, current Senate candidate Herschel Walker gets new coaches: McConnell, Cruz, Trump
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If you’ve ever heard Georgia Senate candidate Herschel Walker talk about politics, it can be cringe-worthy at best, and inaccurate at worst.
Walker has never run for office before and has lived in Texas since 2011, so it’s understandable that he wouldn’t know everything about politics or the state of Georgia. But it doesn’t really excuse the many ridiculous and untrue things he’s uttered. This guy needs help.
Hence the need for a few GOP heavyweights to coach. He can’t avoid debates and stick to talking exclusively to Fox News forever. I mean, he’s gonna have to start defending all those murky-ass financial records, his touted COVID-19 spray, the fact that he lied about graduating from college, and his doubts about evolution if he wants to beat the incumbent Democrat, Sen. Raphael Warnock, senior pastor at Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, and the first Black senator elected to serve in the state of Georgia.
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Walker has made mind-numbing missteps, such as referring to the late Rep. John Lewis as a senator, even implying that Lewis wouldn’t have supported the bill named in his honor.
“Senator Lewis was one of the greatest senators that’s ever been and for African Americans that was absolutely incredible. To throw his name on a bill for voting rights I think is a shame,” Walker said in an interview. He added that the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act “just doesn’t fit what John Lewis stood for, and I think [Democrats] know that. And I think that it’s sad for them to do this to him.”
So it’s clear Walker doesn’t know that Lewis was a congressman or that the iconic civil rights hero spent his career fighting for voting rights.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution (AJC) reports that in order to help him out, Walker’s camp has set up “policy time” to meet with a few Republicans who can school him on what he needs to know—or whatever he’s never learned.
So far Walker has met with Sen. Lindsey Graham, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Sen. Ted Cruz, and according to a source affiliated with Walker, “of course, he speaks regularly with the former president,” according to the AJC.
Walker has additionally set up “listening sessions,” where he meets with industry leaders around the state to learn how federal issues are impacting Georgia.
But in addition to coaching, Walker is also badly in need of honing his skills in explaining his finances.
According to Georgia Public Broadcasting (GPB), Walker’s recent personal financial disclosures are uniquely opaque, which could make it challenging for voters to discern exactly who he’s aligned with.
“According to this candidate’s financial disclosure form, no person or entity paid more than $5,000 for any services provided by him—at the same time, he disclosed an interest in an LLC valued at more than $25 million and that provides ‘business consulting and professional services,’” Stephen Spaulding, a senior adviser at government watchdog organization Common Cause, told GPB. “This may raise questions for voters trying to screen for conflicts of interest who want to know more about who got what from the consulting and professional consulting firm that bears his name and pays him millions in shareholder income.”
The Daily Beast reports that in addition to his financial records being loose on specificity, in one case, a business he claims to own may not actually be his.
“According to a review of business records, that company—either Renaissance Manufacturing or Renaissance Hospitality, depending on the telling (though both are now dissolved)—was not his in any common sense of ownership; it was part of a business arrangement with the true owner,” according to The Daily Beast.
Walker has also claimed that Renaissance Man was “the largest minority-owned food business in the country” according to an interview he gave to Fox-28 in Savannah, Georgia, when, according to The Daily Beast, that can’t be substantiated either.
How this guy is polling ahead of Sen. Warnock, I’ll never know.