- GOP consultants have hired a law firm to conduct research on Walker ahead of his Senate race, according to NBC News.
- The company compiled a 500-page dossier on Walker, which contained potentially problematic issues.
- Walker and his wife believed that his goodwill among Georgians would dampen the negative attacks against him.
Even before Herschel Walker declared his candidacy for the Senate in August 2021, there were already major questions regarding the viability of a possible campaign.
As Walker pondered his entry into the race, he spoke with top GOP consultants Austin Chambers, Paul Bennecke and Nick Ayers, who hired a law firm to delve into the potential nominee’s background, according to NBC News.
For most campaigns, such an effort is a typical exercise; this helps assess the type of opposition research that might be brought together in a political campaign.
But in the space of just two weeks, the company had compiled a 500-page dossier on Walker that detailed potential issues involving his companies, as well as questionable public statements and allegations of abuse, according to four sources who came to interviewed with NBC News.
‘We found 500 pages in two weeks on you and God only knows what else is there,’ Chambers told Walker, according to a source who heard the pair talking at the home of a GOP donor. in the upscale Buckhead neighborhood of Atlanta.
The three consultants did not stick around for Walker’s campaign, but the former University of Georgia footballer threw his hat in the ring despite the information that had been uncovered, some of which was already in the public domain.
Shortly before Walker announced his campaign, the Associated Press published a damning article detailing accusations from his ex-wife Cindy Grossman, who in their divorce proceedings spoke of his “physically violent and threatening behavior”.
But Walker and his current wife, Julie Blanchard Walker, were undeterred by the report.
Prior to the campaign announcement, the couple felt that Walker’s longtime status as a football icon in the Peach State and his ability to connect with people would nullify any bad press publicity. or political attack that would surely be launched by the Democratic Party, according to people who told NBC News they spoke with the couple ahead of the August 2021 launch date.
Once Walker was officially nominated, he quickly coalesced support among Republican primary votes, which was turbocharged by his endorsement of former President Donald Trump.
But this year, his campaign has been rocked by several scandals.
Two women have alleged that Walker, who ran on an anti-abortion platform, paid for their abortions. The Republican denied the allegations, but in a public poll the week before the run-off, he was not considered a trustworthy candidate by a majority of the electorate.
When it was revealed that Walker had other children whom he had not disclosed to the public, his campaign was also forced to react to the developments, which put him out of the message as he sought to rally GOP voters.
Last month, questions swirled around the campaign over a property tax exemption that Walker sought in Texas in 2021 and this year, despite running for a Senate seat in Georgia, according to a CNN KFile report. .
In the November general election, Warnock edged Walker 49.4% to 48.5% statewide, but the results triggered a runoff as none of the candidates met the required 50% threshold for win the election.
Last week, Warnock beat Walker in the second round 51.4%-48.6%.
The result made Walker the only statewide Republican candidate to lose his race in Georgia that year.
businessinsider
