Republicans May Yet Abandon Herschel Walker
Voters are more likely to exercise their moral judgment in lower-stakes races — and that could spell trouble for Georgia’s Republican Senate candidate.
Still in the running.
Photographer: Megan Varner/Getty Images North AmericaThe race between Democratic incumbent Raphael Warnock and Republican challenger Herschel Walker in Georgia may determine which party controls the US Senate. It will also show how much voters care these days about character. My guess: more than the cynics say.
It’s certainly true that, as recently as 10 years ago, America would not have had a debate about whether a candidate for Senate could survive credible allegations of paying for a girlfriend’s abortion and then lying about it, or the disclosure of the existence of two previously unacknowledged children, or the candidate’s own admission of past domestic violence. His polling would have plummeted. His party would have concluded that he had no chance of winning and that continued support for him would bring it discredit.