Trump-backed Herschel Walker reports hauling in nearly $10M since launching GOP Senate bid in Georgia

EXCLUSIVE: Republican Senate candidate Herschel Walker is off to a really quick begin in the case of fundraising for his Senate marketing campaign as he tries to unseat Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock of Georgia within the November’s midterm elections.

The previous skilled and faculty soccer star working again, who received a Heisman Trophy and helped propel the College of Georgia to a nationwide championship, introduced on Wednesday that his marketing campaign pulled in almost $10 million in fundraising from his late August launch by means of the top of final yr. Walker’s marketing campaign additionally reported raking in $5.4 million through the October-December fourth quarter of fundraising.

SENATE GOP REELECTION COMMITTEE HAULS IN A RECORD $104M LAST YEAR

Walker’s workforce, which shared their fundraising figures first nationally with Fox Information, showcased that their haul the previous three months got here from 44,364 particular person donors from all 50 states.

“As we journey all around the Peach State, we’re assembly 1000’s of hardworking Georgians who’re fed up with the course our nation is headed,” Walker stated in a press release as he highlighted his fundraising figures. “Although I’ve been blessed with many superb alternatives, working for U.S. Senate to characterize my dwelling state is the best honor and privilege of my life. We couldn’t do it with out your assist and are trying ahead to profitable the first in Might and the overall election in November.”

SENATE GOP REELECTION ARM TARGETS VULNERABLE SENATE DEMOCRATS FOR GIVING STIMULUS CHECKS TO PRISONERS

Walker is taken into account the clear front-runner within the GOP major, because of his excessive identify recognition within the Peach State and the endorsement he acquired from former President Donald Trump – who for months inspired Walker to run and who stays very talked-about and influential amongst Republican voters in Georgia and throughout the nation. And up to date polling suggests Walker holding a large lead over his Republican rivals.

Walker marketing campaign supervisor Scott Paradise touted that “this huge fundraising haul, doubtless the most important within the nation for a non-incumbent, exhibits that Georgia Republicans are clearly united behind Herschel Walker and are able to tackle Senator Warnock.”

4 different Republican working for the GOP Senate nomination within the Peach State. They’re Georgia Agriculture Commissioner Gary Black, Latham Saddler, a businessman, former Nationwide Safety Council official through the Trump administration and former Navy SEAL officer, Kelvin King, a U.S. Air Pressure veteran and businessman, and businessman and former state consultant Josh Clark.

Walker has run a fastidiously scripted marketing campaign since leaping into the race, and his critics proceed to notice that Walker, as a first-time candidate, is untested underneath hearth on the marketing campaign path and has not made it clear the place he stands on some key points. They usually highlight that Walker comes with loads of potential political baggage that would give his opponents ammunition – from his well-documented struggles with a psychological sickness often known as dissociative id dysfunction, and accusations by his ex-wife of being “bodily abusive.”

GOP SEN. TIM SCOTT OF SOUTH CAROLINA HAULS IN NEARLY $7M THE PAST THREE MONTHS

Because the GOP goals to win again the Senate majority they misplaced in January 2021 when the Democrats narrowly swept Georgia’s twin Senate runoff elections, they’re enjoying loads of protection, defending 20 of the 34 seats up for grabs, together with 5 open seats – with two of them within the essential battlegrounds of Pennsylvania and North Carolina.

However additionally they see alternatives to flip blue seats crimson in 4 key swing states, together with Georgia. They usually view Warnock as one of the crucial susceptible Democrats working for reelection this yr.

Warnock defeated Republican Sen. Kelly Loeffler, who was appointed by GOP Gov. Brian Kemp, by a razor-thin margin a yr in the past, to serve the ultimate two years of the time period of former GOP Sen. Johnny Isakson, who resigned in 2019 as a result of well being causes. 

However defeating Warnock subsequent yr received’t be straightforward, as Georgia’s first Black senator has set fundraising data since taking workplace.

Warnock – the pastor of Atlanta’s famed Ebenezer Baptist Church, the place Martin Luther King Jr. as soon as preached – has but to file his fourth quarter fundraising figures. However he hauled in an eye-popping $9.5 million through the July-September third quarter of fundraising and reported greater than $17.2 million in his marketing campaign coffers at first of October.