Herschel Walker, The Pumpkin Spice Dave Matthews Band Of Black Georgia Politicians

No love for Walker among Black residents of his hometown.

When you're Donald Trump's hand-picked tool to oust the first Black senator from Georgia, you can probably count on Black people not supporting your candidacy.

Such is the case for Republican sideshow act Herschel Walker. The New York Times   ran a feature Sunday about Walker's hometown of Wrightsville, Georgia. Sean Hannity had originally invited Walker onto his show Monday to discuss the "smear" piece but they got distracted by an entirely different "smear" from the Daily Beast. Walker seems to define "smears" and "lies" as unpleasant facts that the public can read.

Wrightsville is located in Johnson County, where Donald Trump carried 70 percent of vote. You'd think this would be Walker country, and yes, there are some Walker campaign signs in the area. As the Times 's John Branch writes, they are "planted in front of big homes with big yards, in a downtown storefront window, near the sidewalk by the Dairy Queen." Don't forget the two near the county courthouse, not far from a Confederate memorial. Wherever you see a Walker for Senate sign, though, there is one common theme.

“All those campaign materials were in the white community,” said Curtis Dixon, who is Black and who taught and coached Mr. Walker, a Republican, in the late 1970s when he was a high school football prodigy. “The only other house that has a Herschel Walker poster is his family.”

In a predominantly Black neighborhood of small homes about a block from where Mr. Walker went to high school, nine people, including a man who said he was Mr. Walker’s cousin, gathered on a steamy Saturday in July to eat and talk in the shade.

No one planned to vote for Mr. Walker. Most scoffed at the thought.

Not even his cousin! He might grudgingly put a Walker poster in his basement, where no one can see it, but he's not going to actually vote for the buffoon. Someone has to protect the trees!

PREVIOUSLY:

 Living Brain Donor Herschel Walker Pretty Sure There’s Too Many Damn Trees On The Planet 

   So What's New With Herschel Walker? 

The Times spoke with a woman who was busy mowing her lawn but took a break to cut Walker to shreds. Forget replacing Warnock in the Senate. She does't even think Walker could make it as mayor of Wrightsville, population 3,638. The current mayor, Janibeth Outlaw, is a local artist. Demographically speaking, Walker has a better shot at the mayor's vote than this Black lady.

“He’s famous to some people, because of football,” she said. “But he’s just Herschel Walker to me.”

He's "just Herschel Walker to me" is the new all-purpose, shade-throwing insult. Warnock needs to book this woman in his next campaign ad.

Walker has the support of at best 10 percent of Black voters in Georgia, although he insists that he's going to "win the Black vote." He's either so dumb he thinks 10 percent is a majority or he's just lying. Both options are possible with him. Curtis Dixon put it plainly: “Herschel’s not getting the Black vote because Herschel forgot where he came from. He’s not part of the Black community.”

Republicans might've known this if they ever actually listened to a Black person, but Walker has never had strong ties to the Black community. This goes back more than 40 years.

It was outside the courthouse in 1979 that the Rev. E.J. Wilson, a Black pastor and civil rights activist new to town, began organizing protests calling out the indignities of being Black in Wrightsville.

Schools had been integrated, but plenty else felt separate and unequal. City jobs and services mostly went to white people. The police force was white. There was an all-white country club but no public parks or pools. Black neighborhoods had dirt roads and leaky sewers. There was still an all-white cemetery, Mr. Wilson pointed out.

And plenty of residents could recall 1948, when the Ku Klux Klan marched on the courthouse and not one of the 400 registered Black voters voted in a primary election the next day.

The New York Times Magazine wrote in 1981 that "some of the protest leaders grabbed Walker, still in uniform and pads, and demanded he join them," but despite repeated pleas from Black residents, Walker never bothered to get involved, and his longtime sports mentor, Gary Jordan, a very white man, proudly declares today, “I’d like to think I had something to do with it ... I said, ‘You can’t get into shape marching. You’ve got to run. And practice is at 3."

Walker ran but he didn't make any progress.

He wrote (theoretically) in his memoir, "I could never really be fully accepted by white students and the African American students either resented me or distrusted me for what they perceived as my failure to stand united with them — regardless of whether they were right or wrong."

That's a tough existence, but Walker seems intent on pursuing acceptance from the white Georgians so eager to reclaim Warnock's Senate seat. He makes them feel better about themselves, telling a group of white women at a recent Wrightsville event, “Don't let anyone tell you that you're racist.” Black Georgia voters, especially women, don't buy this crap, but Walker isn't selling himself to them.

[ New York Times ]

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