PoliticsBarack Obama Herschel Walker
Barack Obama Mercilessly Mocks Herschel Walker With A 'Thought Experiment'
The former president also torched the Donald Trump-backed GOP candidate with a reworked version of his iconic slogan.
Lee Moran
Reporter, HuffPost
Oct 29, 2022, 02:34 AM EDT | Updated Oct 29, 2022
Former President Barack Obama joked about Herschel Walker, the GOP nominee for a U.S. Senate seat in Georgia, on Friday with a "thought experiment" that highlighted the Republican candidate's lack of experience for the political role.
At a campaign rally for Walker's Democratic rival, Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-Ga.), Obama acknowledged that Walker was "a heck of a football player" and "amazing, one of the best running backs of all time."
But that doesn't make him the best person to represent Georgia, the former president argued.
Obama imagined people seeing Walker in the airport or hospital and allowing him to fly the airplane or do surgery because of his success on the football field.
"You wouldn't say that," said Obama.
Obama said "the opposite is true, too" in that people may have liked him as a president but wouldn't want his "slow, old, skinny behind" on the football field.
"You'd have to scrape me off the field," he cracked, before flipping his "Yes, we can" slogan to: "No, I can't. No, I can't."
Obama: "Some of you may not remember, but Herschel Walker was a heck of a football player... does that make him the best person to represent you?... let's say you're at the airport & you see Walker & you say, Hey, there's Herschel, Heisman winner. Let's have him fly the plane!" pic.twitter.com/ObyfIsOAEA
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) October 29, 2022
Elsewhere in Obama's stumping for Warnock, he slammed Walker as "a celebrity that wants to be a politician" and attacked his "issues of character," an apparent reference to allegations that Walker in the past paid for two women to terminate their pregnancies. Walker, who is running on a strict anti-abortion agenda, denies the claims.
Walker and Warnock are in a tight race, per polling.
Walker would be so loyal to Trump that it would mean "he is not going to be really thinking about you or your needs," Obama said.
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