Georgia's Republican lieutenant governor criticizes GOP for electing Herschel Walker as nominee
Georgia's Republican Lt. Gov. Geoffrey Duncan has spoken out against Herschel Walker, the current GOP Senate nominee in the state. Duncan criticized the Republican Party and said he isn't voting for Walker after The Daily Beast reported Walker paid for an ex-girlfriend to get an abortion, which the candidate has denied.
Walker, a former NFL player, has voiced his opposition to abortion on the campaign trail and supports a national ban on abortions after 15 weeks.
The unnamed woman who claimed Walker paid for her 2009 abortion also said she is the mother of one of his children, whom he hasn't publicly spoken about, The Daily Beast reported Wednesday. CBS News has not independently verified the report, which Walker has flatly denied. He also continues to deny that he knows who the woman is.
Georgia's midterm elections will be held on Nov. 8, when Walker will face Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock, who made history in 2021 as Georgia's first Black senator after defeating then-incumbent Sen. Kelly Loeffler in a Senate runoff election.
"I'm not voting for Sen. Warnock, and like a lot of other Georgians, Herschel Walker has not yet earned my vote," Duncan told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution after The Daily Beast report last week. "He's got four weeks left to change our minds."
Many Republicans have continued to support their nominee. Republican National Convention Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel called the report "an attempt to distract from Warnock's record of failure resulting in rising costs and out-of-control crime."
President Donald Trump is friends with Walker, who appeared on a season of "The Apprentice." Trump put out a statement on his Truth Social platform defending Walker, saying in part: "They are trying to destroy a man who has true greatness in his future, just as he had athletic greatness in his past."
Walker's son Christian, however, said he was "done" supporting his father's campaign after the initial Daily Beast story. "[H]ow DARE YOU LIE and act as though you're some 'moral, Christian, upright man.' You've lived a life of DESTROYING other peoples lives. How dare you," Christian Walker tweeted earlier this week. Herschel Walker says he loves his son unconditionally.
Georgia's Republican Gov. Brian Kemp, who is up for reelection, has largely avoided speaking about Walker, but Duncan has continued to criticize the party for choosing Walker as the nominee.
"Unfortunately, Republicans looked around to see who Donald Trump supported and he was a famous football player and so he became our nominee and now we're paying the price for that," Duncan said in an interview with CNN last week.
Duncan said he and other Republicans in Georgia have "nowhere to go right now" in terms of choosing who to vote for.
"[Republicans] let down the entire country," Duncan said. "Donald Trump led us down a rabbit trail post-election because he was too consumed trying to save face after his election. And he ran us down a trail and we screwed up."
Duncan also wrote an op-ed for CNN, further criticizing the Republican Party for trying to regain a majority in the Senate with Walker, an "untested and unproven first-time candidate."
He said while Walker has denied the claims and threatened legal action, the public's criticism of him was intense and Duncan is unsure if Walker can win the election.
"If we want the American public to take us [Republicans] seriously, we need to take the first step by nominating candidates they should take seriously," Duncan wrote. "That process goes beyond celebrity or fame. It requires leaders capable of winning elections by articulating a conservative vision for governing."
CBS News has reached out to Duncan for further comment and is awaiting response.