By Gregory Krieg | CNN
The girl who stated Georgia Senate hopeful Herschel Walker paid for her 2009 abortion, setting off an issue that has rocked his marketing campaign, instructed The New York Instances that the Republican nominee requested her to terminate a second being pregnant two years later.
She refused the request, and their relationship ended, she instructed the Instances, which stated it was withholding the title of the girl. Walker was single on the time. Their son, she stated, is now 10 years outdated.
Walker, who stated in Might he helps a full ban on abortions, with no exceptions, has denied an earlier report from The Each day Beast, by which the girl first alleged that the previous soccer star reimbursed her for an abortion she sought at his urging.
Talking to the Instances, the girl stated she determined to return ahead with new particulars about her relationship with Walker after his Republican allies rallied round him within the aftermath of the primary report.
The Instances stated that interviews it performed with the girl and paperwork offered to the newspaper “collectively corroborate and broaden upon an account about her abortion first revealed on Monday in The Each day Beast. The Instances additionally independently confirmed particulars with custody data filed in household courtroom in New York and interviewed a buddy of the girl to whom she had described the abortion and her eventual breakup with Mr. Walker as these occasions occurred.”
CNN has not independently confirmed the girl’s allegation in regards to the abortion or that Walker urged her to terminate a second being pregnant.
CNN has reached out to the Walker marketing campaign for remark. The Instances left messages Friday afternoon with Walker’s spokesman and marketing campaign supervisor.
Walker vehemently denied the preliminary report about paying for the abortion within the Each day Beast, within the “strongest potential phrases” and stated it was a “flat-out lie.”
The Georgia race between Walker and Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock is among the many best Senate contests on the 2022 midterm slate and could possibly be instrumental in deciding management of the evenly divided chamber. Walker, who was endorsed by former President Donald Trump, gained the GOP nomination in Might regardless of some Republicans’ issues about previous allegations that he threatened ladies with violence. Walker has denied not less than a type of allegations and has spoken publicly and written about his struggles with psychological sickness.
With the stakes set so excessive, Republican teams have vowed to not abandon Walker, even because the scandal despatched his marketing campaign scrambling. Marketing campaign supervisor Scott Paradise, addressing employees earlier this week, acknowledged that the preliminary Each day Beast report was a setback, however pointed to Trump’s victory in 2016 — regardless of the preliminary backlash to the discharge of the “Entry Hollywood” tape by which he spoke crudely about groping ladies — as proof that Walker remained a viable candidate.
Warnock has largely refused to weigh in on the allegation, dodging a query about its implications earlier this week.
“I’ll let the pundits resolve how they suppose it can affect the race,” the senator stated, earlier than pivoting to his broader message on abortion rights. “However I've been constant in my opinion that a affected person’s room is simply too slim and cramped an area for a girl, her physician, and the federal government. … And my opponent, then again, is speaking a couple of nationwide ban with no exceptions.”
The Instances, like The Each day Beast, reported that Walker gave the girl a verify for $700 for the process, which came about at a clinic in Atlanta. In response to each shops, Walker additionally despatched the girl a “get nicely” card afterward.
Earlier Friday, Walker’s marketing campaign break up from its political director, Taylor Crowe, over suspicions that he was leaking data to the media, two individuals aware of the matter instructed CNN. Crowe didn't reply to a number of requests for remark from CNN. It's unclear if there have been different elements at play or if the transfer had any connection to the abortion allegations.
Although Walker’s marketing campaign stays in any other case intact and his assist from nationwide Republicans has stayed in place, certainly one of his personal sons, Christian Walker, 23, a conservative social media influencer, has turned on him.
“Each member of the family of Herschel Walker requested him to not run for workplace, as a result of all of us knew (a few of) his previous. Each single one. He determined to provide us the center finger and air out all of his soiled laundry in public, whereas concurrently mendacity about it,” Christian Walker tweeted shortly after the Each day Beast report was revealed on Monday, the primary in a sequence of posts denouncing his father. “I’m executed.”
Walker has dismissed that criticism, saying at a Thursday information convention of his grownup son, “He’s an incredible little man. I really like him to loss of life. And you understand what, I'll at all times love him, it doesn't matter what my son says.”
Christian Walker has not responded to an e-mail and social media messages from CNN searching for touch upon his criticism of his father.