Herschel Walker is one of Donald Trump’s top henchmen of voter disinformation.
He urged Republicans to stand by Trump in November 2020, when it was clear that Joe Biden had won the general election. Walker even went as far as tweeting Nov. 4 that anyone voting illegally should be prosecuted.
Well, Walker may have to put his devotion to election integrity to the test with his own wife, Julie Blanchard, who voted in Georgia’s 2020 election—from Westlake, Texas, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Blanchard used her Atlanta address to return an absentee ballot that she mailed from their Texas residence in October. When contacted by AJC, Blanchard saw nothing wrong with her actions.
“If we’re residents in both places, is that legally wrong?” Blanchard said. “If you have multiple homes, you can’t vote where you have a home?”
Blanchard said she considers herself a resident of Georgia, where she has a driver’s license, owns a car and does business during a followup interview with AJC, but she didn’t say whether she spends more time at her Georgia or Texas home. Prior to the 2020 election, there was no record of Blanchard voting in Georgia since 2008. In 2017, her voter registration was canceled because of inactivity. She re-registered in 2019, but it is unclear if she was automatically registered when she renewed her driver’s license. Blanchard is not registered to vote in Texas.
Here’s more on this story, per AJC:
State law determines residency based on where a voter’s “habitation is fixed,” and those who move to another state with the intention of making it their residence lose their eligibility to vote in Georgia.
Blanchard and Walker purchased their Texas property in 2011 and received a homestead exemption on their property taxes, according to public records. Homestead exemptions are granted to homeowners for their legal residence. Blanchard didn’t claim a homestead exemption on her Fulton County property last year.
The Georgia secretary of state’s office didn’t immediately comment Monday on whether Blanchard was under investigation.
Blanchard and Walker married in Texas in May, according to public records. Walker was previously married to Cindy Grossman before their divorce in 2002.
Walker, who has lived in Texas for decades, has hinted for months that he might move to Georgia to run for the U.S. Senate, and Trump has said the former University of Georgia football star would be “unstoppable.”
At this point, Walker has not been accused of voting outside of the state of Georgia, so the attention on his wife is basically addressing his hypocrisy. We’ll see how all of this unfolds. But he is the top candidate to take on Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock, according to a recent poll that has him trailing the pastor by just two points.
This race is very critical for Democrats because Biden won Georgia by just 12,000 votes. Georgia turned blue primarily because of grassroots organizing and those same activist-lead efforts will be needed for Warnock to secure a full term. Say what you will about Walker, but he is a Republican—a popular one.
If he does, in fact, join the 2020 race, all hands on deck will be needed to win because Democrats cannot afford to lose a seat in the Senate. They are barely able to maintain power as it is with Vice President Kamala Harris as the tie-breaking vote.