Herschel Walker is somehow still making things worse for himself.
The ex-NFL star and Georgia GOP Senate nominee forcefully denied a Daily Beast report earlier this week that he had paid for an abortion in 2009. Walker said he didn’t know the woman involved and even hinted that he would sue the digital outlet for defamation.
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But it turns out the woman whose abortion he allegedly paid for is also the mother of one of his children, the Daily Beast reported Wednesday.
The woman, whose identity has not been reported, chose to come forward after Walker denied paying for the abortion to Fox News multiple times. “I have no idea, but it is a flat-out lie,” Walker told Sean Hannity Tuesday, when asked if he knew the woman who’d made the claim. On Wednesday, he told Brian Kilmeade: “Everyone is anonymous, or everyone is leaking, and they want you to confess to something you have no clue about.”
The woman told the Daily Beast that she was reluctant to reveal more details for the privacy of her and her family, but revealed she’s the mother of one of Walker’s children after his denials.
“I’ve been very civil thus far,” she told the Daily Beast. “I keep my mouth shut. I don’t cause any trouble. I stay in the background. But I’m also not gonna get run over time and time again. That’s crazy.”
The woman, who’d previously provided receipts that Walker had reimbursed her for the abortion and sent her a get-well card, said Walker “seemed pretty pro-choice to me” because he paid for the abortion, and also said she came forward because of Walker’s hypocrisy.
Walker has said he would support a national ban on abortion with no exceptions for rape, incest, or to save the life of the mother, saying in May: “There’s no exception in my mind. I believe in life.”
“I’m not trying to glorify abortion—that’s a very personal choice that everyone has to make for themselves—but I have no shame in it,” the woman told the Daily Beast. “It is what it is. It’s part of my story, and what makes me who I am today.”
“He didn’t accept responsibility for the kid we did have together, and now he isn’t accepting responsibility for the one that we didn’t have,” she said of Walker. “That says so much about how he views the role of women in childbirth, versus his own. And now he wants to take that choice away from other women and couples entirely.”
Walker is locked in a tight race with Sen. Raphael Warnock that could determine who controls the Senate next year. The first public poll conducted after the abortion allegation was reported showed Warnock with a slim lead over Walker.
Despite the allegations, Walker has continued to receive support from Republican leaders, including Senate Republican campaign chair Rick Scott and a PAC aligned with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell. Walker’s campaign also touted “record-breaking fundraising numbers” this week, which still put him well behind Warnock.
Walker’s son Christian, a right-wing social media influencer, called his father out in a series of tweets and videos earlier this week for his “lies” and for “making a mockery” of Christian and his mother.
After the latest story came out, on Wednesday, Christian Walker tweeted: “Wear a condom, damn.”
Christian Walker’s mother cited “physically abusive and extremely threatening behavior” when she divorced Herschel Walker in 2001, and said in an ABC interview after Walker disclosed he suffers from multiple personality disorder that he’d once held a gun to her head and threatened to “blow my brains out.”
After Christian Walker’s tweets earlier this week, he has been accused by figures on the right of attempting to sabotage his father’s campaign. Herschel Walker himself has seemingly embraced this theory. During a “Prayer Warriors for Herschel” lunch in Georgia on Tuesday, Walker joked about physically disciplining his 23-year-old son, according to the Atlanta-Journal Constitution.
“I’ve got to get back to him and spank him,” Herschel Walker said.
And throughout the week, Walker has continued to deny he paid for the abortion. In a Thursday interview with conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt, he said, “I know this is untrue, and they keep telling me things that are totally, totally untrue, and I’m not sure why that would be told. I know nothing of any woman having an abortion.”
“If that had happened, I would have said there’s nothing to be ashamed of there,” Walker continued. “People have done that, but I know nothing about it.”