ATLANTA — A woman who accused Republican Senate hopeful Herschel Walker of pressuring her to have an abortion nearly three decades ago showed her face for the first time in an interview with "Good Morning America" and said she felt “threatened” by the football star after she revealed to him she was pregnant.
In the interview, broadcast Tuesday, the woman expounded on the allegations she first leveled anonymously a week ago — that she had a yearslong romantic relationship with Walker but when she became pregnant in 1993 he urged her to have an abortion and drove her back to a Texas clinic to complete the procedure after she changed her mind. Walker is a staunch opponent of abortion rights. This time, the woman appeared on camera but still did not reveal her name.
Walker on Tuesday said the claim was “a lie a week ago and it is a lie today."
He also denied knowing the woman, who first came forward anonymously a week ago with her lawyer, Gloria Allred, even though she showed a picture that showed them together.
“Seven days before an election, the Democrats trot out Gloria Allred and some woman I do not know,” Walker said.
In the new interview, the woman said her relationship with Walker, who was married, changed after she became pregnant.
”He was very clear that he did not want me to have the child and he said that he said that because of his wife’s family and powerful people around him that I would not be safe and that the child would not be safe,” she said.
“That’s very menacing,” ABC reporter Juju Chang replied.
“It is very menacing. It is very menacing. And I felt threatened and I thought I had no choice,” she said.
The woman is the second to come forward to claim that Walker encouraged her to have an abortion after becoming pregnant by him. That other woman, who has spoken to other news outlets without revealing her name or her face has declined to speak to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. She told other outlets that Walker paid for her 2009 abortion and urged her to have a second, but she did not. She and Walker have a child together.
A new Atlanta Journal-Constitution poll shows Walker and his Democratic opponent, U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock are running neck and neck. Both campaigns are preparing for a December runoff if no candidate gets a majority of the vote in the Nov. 8 election.
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