Herschel Walker’s Bad Night

Things looked good for Herschel Walker on Monday morning. The football legend and Georgia Republican, having survived a summer of embarrassing headlines, was keeping his Senate race close against Democratic incumbent Raphael Warnock, thanks to strong coattails from Gov. Brian Kemp, a resonant pro-America message, and improved message discipline in recent weeks.
But Monday night, in the space of just a few hours, the bottom fell out of Walker’s campaign.
First came an explosive report from the Daily Beast: A woman alleged that she had conceived a child with Walker in 2009, that he had urged her to get an abortion, and that he had then paid for it. The report was corroborated by a friend she had reportedly told at the time and physical evidence: a receipt for a $700 personal check dated the same week as the abortion and a get-well card, both signed by Walker.
Walker fiercely denied the report. “I’m not taking this anymore,” he said in a statement posted to Twitter. “I planning [sic] to sue the Daily Beast for this defamatory lie. It will be filed tomorrow morning.”