This past Tuesday, Senate candidate Herschel Walker (R) issued his response to a recent massive report focused on his political opponent, incumbent Senator Raphael Warnock (D-GA), claiming that he threatened to evict poor residents from low-income housing under the ownership of his church.
The report in question, which was written by investigative reporter Andrew Kerr from The Washington Free Beacon, unveiled that to go along with the threatening of evictions throughout the Columbia Tower of MLK Village in the area of downtown Atlanta, Warnock’s church issues the man an overtly lavish $7,417 monthly stipend for just the mans housing.
Since early 2020, 12 eviction lawsuits have been filed against residents of Columbia Tower at MLK Village, which Warnock's church owns 99% of.
The average rent owed by the residents clocked in at just $125 a month.
The building has received over $15 million in taxpayer funding.
— Andrew Kerr (@AndrewKerrNC) October 11, 2022
Warnock currently works for Ebenezer Baptist Church as their senior pastor, pulling in a salary to go along with the massive housing stipend, and the church itself currently has 99% ownership of the Columbia Tower building — which has been labeled as a place for those with “mental disabilities” or those who have been suffering under homelessness.
As read in the report from Kerr, a total of 12 lawsuits over eviction have been filed since back in February of 2020 — at which time Warnock was heavily criticizing Republicans for standing against a mortgage and rent payment moratorium.
“Unemployment benefits have expired, rent is due today, and many Georgia families are at risk of eviction in the middle of a pandemic,” stated Warnock via social media back on the 1st of August, 2020. “My opponents are supposed to be serving the people in Washington, but they’re clearly only concerned with serving their own interests.”
Unemployment benefits have expired, rent is due today, and many Georgia families are at risk of eviction in the middle of a pandemic.
My opponents are supposed to be serving the people in Washington, but they're clearly only concerned with serving their own interests
— Reverend Raphael Warnock (@ReverendWarnock) August 1, 2020
Residents of the complex were reportedly entirely unaware that the church even had ownership of the building — seemingly entirely by design. It was only after jumping through numerous hoops and layers trying to obfuscate it that Warnock’s name first started to show up on anything official: “Ebenezer Baptist Church owns the building through a network of shell organizations connected to the Ebenezer Building Foundation, a 501(c)(3) charity that delegates all management duties to the church and identifies Warnock as its principal officer in its IRS Form 990 filings.”
“They treat me like a piece of s***. They’re not compassionate at all,” expressed 69-year-old Phillip White, a resident of Columbia Tower and Vietnam Veteran, stating that the building had attempted to officially evict him in two separate instances. The first time he paid back rent, a total of $179 with over $325 in fees.
Herschel Walker, Warnock’s top opponent and former NFL running back, issued a response to the recent report via social media that morning.
“I have never known a preacher that likes abortion even after birth, won’t pay his child support and evicts poor people to the street. I will pay the $4500 in past due rents listed in this news article to keep @ReverendWarnock from evicting these people,” stated Walker.
I have never known a preacher that likes abortion even after birth, won’t pay his child support and evicts poor people to the street. I will pay the $4500 in past due rents listed in this news article to keep @ReverendWarnock from evicting these people. https://t.co/IqSBIWUnLU
— Herschel Walker (@HerschelWalker) October 11, 2022