Politics

By David Lawder

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. President Joe Biden will act “methodically” in deciding how to respond to Saudi Arabia over oil output cuts, but options include changes to U.S. security assistance, White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan said on Sunday.

Sullivan, speaking on CNN, said no changes to the U.S.-Saudi relationship were imminent as Biden re-evaluates it.

“And so the president isn’t going act precipitously. He is going to act methodically, strategically and he’s going to take his time to consult with members of both parties, and also to have an opportunity for Congress to return so that he can sit with them in person and work through the options,” Sullivan said.

A day after OPEC+ oil producers last week announced output cuts over U.S. objections, Biden vowed to impose “consequences” on Saudi Arabia for siding with Russia in supporting the cuts. The OPEC+ move undermines Western countries’ plans to impose a cap on the price of Russian oil exports in response to Moscow’s war in Ukraine.

U.S. Senator Bob Menendez, a Democrat who chairs the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, called for a halt to most U.S. arms sales to Saudi Arabia after the OPEC+ move.

Biden’s options “include changes to our approach to security assistance to Saudi Arabia, but I’m not going to get ahead of the president. What I will say is there’s nothing imminent,” Sullivan said, adding that there was time for Biden to consult with Congress.

Sullivan said Biden has no plans to meet with Saudi Arabia’s de-facto leader, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, at a G20 leaders summit in November in Indonesia.

Asked whether Biden would view Russia’s use of a small tactical nuclear weapon or detonating one in the Black Sea as less serious than a larger bomb, Sullivan said it was “dangerous” to draw such distinctions, and the president would not do so.

“The use of a nuclear weapon on the battlefield in Ukraine is the use of a nuclear weapon on the battlefield in Ukraine. We’re not going to slice the salami,” Sullivan added.

He said it was incumbent upon NATO allies and other responsible countries, including China and India, to “send a very clear and decisive message to Russia that they should not contemplate the use of nuclear weapons in this conflict.”

(Reporting by David Lawder; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama and Lisa Shumaker)

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. Department of Justice on Friday asked a federal appeals court to end a special third-party review of documents seized from former President Donald Trump’s home in Florida, arguing that a district court judge lacked authority to appoint a special master.

(Reporting by Sarah Lynch and Dan Whitcomb; Editing by Katharine Jackson)

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SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Californians are voting now through Election Day on whether to approve a state constitutional amendment that would guarantee the right to abortion and contraception, one of several measures on ballots nationwide this November to address reproductive health care following the U.S. Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade.

Proposition 1 is expected to pass in the heavily Democratic state and was part of a robust legislative package backed by Gov. Gavin Newsom to ensure California remains a haven for people seeking abortion services. Legislators placed the measure to amend the constitution on the Nov. 8 ballot days just after the court ruled in June that states could decide whether to allow abortion.

Polling shows high support for the measure — at least two-thirds of likely voters said yes in two surveys — with minimal financial opposition from the California Republican Party and others who call the proposition expensive, extreme and unnecessary.

But the measure’s supporters want to send a resounding message that abortion is legal and accessible in California, and they hope a solid win will inspire other states also to enshrine the right in their constitutions.

“The challenge is we had a very short runway, so it really is about awareness. We know when people are aware that abortion is on the ballot, they’re likely to come out and vote for it,” said Jodi Hicks, president of Planned Parenthood Affiliates of California, which supports the measure.

California joins Michigan and Vermont in asking voters in November to protect the right to abortion. In Kentucky, voters will be asked to amend the state constitution to declare there is not a right to an abortion. A measure in Montana asks voters whether to require medical care and treatment for infants born alive after an attempted abortion.

The amendment in California would declare that the state “shall not deny or interfere with an individual’s reproductive freedom in their most intimate decisions, which includes their fundamental right to choose to have an abortion and their fundamental right to choose or refuse contraceptives.”

Opponents say the measure was put on the ballot to score political points with women and drive voter turnout in favor of Democrats. They also say the measure contains no gestational or viability limits on abortion, meaning a fetus could be aborted late in pregnancy even though it’s capable of surviving outside the womb.

California law currently restricts abortion to only before a fetus is viable, which is usually defined as around 24 weeks of pregnancy. Abortions in the third trimester are rare, and in California, permitted only if the mother’s life or heath is at risk.

“Californians don’t support late term abortions,” said Catherine Hadro, spokesperson for the No on Prop. 1 campaign.

The measure’s supporters say a constitutional amendment enshrining abortion will have no bearing on limits placed on abortions by lawmakers.

“The constitution has always meant to be a broad framework of rights and the Legislature decides the scope of the laws, this won’t change what is in statute right now,” said Hicks of Planned Parenthood affiliates.

A September survey by the Public Policy Institute of California found 69% of likely voters would support the proposition, including 33% of Republicans. An August poll by the Institute of Governmental Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, found that 71% of registered voters would vote yes.

Nearly 40% of people who said they would vote yes said that abortion should be legal in most, but not all, cases, said Mark Baldassare, president and CEO of the Public Policy Institute of California. It’s not clear how much opponents’ arguments will stick with voters, if at all.

“That’s something people will be asking about between now and Election Day, especially those people who say it should be OK in most cases,” he said.

Before Roe was overturned, the overwhelming majority of abortions in the United States — around 90% — occurred in the first trimester or at 13 weeks or earlier, said Katrina Kimport, associate professor in the Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology & Reproductive Sciences at the University of California, San Francisco. An estimated 1% of abortions occurred at 21 weeks or later, she said.

Women who have abortions in the third trimester generally fall into one of two categories, she said. They’ve either learned new information, such as a serious health issue with the fetus that could not be ascertained in earlier trimesters, or they faced insurmountable obstacles preventing them from getting an abortion earlier.

The U.S. Supreme Court’s June decision in Dobbs may actually increase the number of women seeking third-trimester abortions, she said.

California’s abortion ballot measure and new state legislation protecting abortion are all “helpful but not sufficient,” said Donna Crane, political science lecturer at San José State University and Menlo College.

That’s because Congress can always pass a federal ban and the conservative U.S. Supreme Court is likely to take up new conflicts that could result in more limitations, said Crane, who served nearly two decades as strategist and lobbyist with NARAL Pro-Choice America in Washington, D.C. and supports Prop. 1.

“California can pass law after law after law,” she said, “and the federal law will always trump us.”

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WASHINGTON (AP) — In an extraordinary step, the House Jan. 6 committee has voted unanimously to subpoena former President Donald Trump — a final effort to get the full story of the Capitol insurrection as the panel wraps up its work by the end of the year.

Trump still does not acknowledge the “former” in front of “president,” and he has been relentlessly hostile to the investigation. He called it a “charade and a witch hunt” in a letter to the committee on Friday — but notably did not mention the subpoena or say whether he would comply with the demand for his appearance.

The attempt to compel Trump’s testimony comes as the committee is tying together multiple investigative threads and compiling its final report. The panel is only authorized through this Congress, which ends on Jan. 3.

A look at what’s next as the panel sprints to its finish:

THE TRUMP SUBPOENA

The nine-member committee has interviewed more than 1,000 witnesses, including many of the former president’s top White House aides. And they have laid out a detailed timeline of Trump’s efforts to overturn his 2020 election defeat — including his inaction as his supporters stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. But they still want to hear from Trump himself.

Now that a subpoena has been authorized — on Thursday — it must be delivered in writing to Trump. That step, expected early next week, will set a date for an interview and lay out requests for documents.

Trump and his lawyers will then decide how to respond. He could comply, negotiate with the committee, announce he will defy the subpoena or ignore it altogether. He could also go to court and try to stop it.

If Trump doesn’t comply, the panel will have to weigh the practical and political implications of a vote on holding him in contempt of Congress. If the full House voted to recommend such a charge, the Justice Department would then review the case.

The committee has taken that step with some of Trump’s allies who refused to comply with subpoenas, including Steve Bannon, who was convicted of contempt in July. But holding a former president in contempt would be another matter, an exceptional step for any Congress.

In his letter on Friday, Trump repeated his false claims of widespread election fraud and said he was writing to express “anger, disappointment and complaint” that the committee wasn’t investigating his claims. He also took the opportunity to boast anew about the size of the crowd that gathered for his speech near the White House on the morning of Jan. 6, before he sent them marching to the Capitol. He included aerial photographs. He said nothing about the subpoena.

Even if he does comply, there’s reason to doubt that Trump’s appearance would help the investigation. He did respond to some written questions from special counsel Robert Mueller during the probe of Russian cooperation with his 2016 campaign. But his answers produced little or nothing to advance the investigation. More recently, he appeared for a deposition by the office of New York State Attorney General Letitia James — but invoked his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination more than 400 times in refusing to answer questions.

WHAT ABOUT PENCE?

The committee is still talking to lawyers for former Vice President Mike Pence, as it has been for months. But it is unclear whether the lawmakers will subpoena the vice president or ask him for testimony.

Several of Pence’s aides have talked to investigators, some providing great detail about his movements and state of mind as he resisted Trump’s pleas to object to the certification of electoral votes that day and try to overturn their defeat to Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.

Video shown Thursday at the committee’s final hearing before the midterm elections showed Pence coordinating with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer for help as the rioters were inside the building, some of them calling for Pence’s execution. The leaders were working with security officials to ensure that they could return to the Capitol and certify Biden’s victory.

A CRIMINAL REFERRAL?

The committee will also have to decide whether to refer any allegations of crimes to the Justice Department. While federal prosecutors are conducting their own investigations into Jan. 6 and Trump’s efforts to overturn the election, the congressional committee has its separate, massive trove of evidence.

Lawmakers on the panel have hinted multiple times over the past year that they will issue criminal referrals. At the hearing on Thursday, Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney, the committee’s Republican vice chairwoman, said that the panel “may ultimately decide” to do so. She said they have “sufficient information to consider criminal referrals for multiple individuals.”

While such a referral would not force any action, it would amplify the political pressure on Attorney General Merrick Garland as the department pursues its own probes.

SECRET SERVICE

The committee recently received more than 1.5 million pages of documents from the Secret Service. But lawmakers say they still don’t have everything they want.

The panel is working to verify the accounts of White House aides who described Trump’s actions on Jan. 6 as he tried to go to the Capitol and accompany his supporters, hundreds of whom eventually broke in. Security officials, along with many White House aides and GOP members of Congress, were vehemently opposed to the idea. Trump was livid and tried, ultimately unsuccessfully, to go to the Capitol anyway, according to several accounts aired by the committee.

California Rep. Pete Aguilar, a Democratic member of the panel, said the lawmakers “will be recalling witnesses and conducting further investigative depositions” based on the Secret Service material. The agency has not turned over text messages that it says were deleted.

FINAL REPORT

The panel’s expected final action will be a massive report laying out evidence, findings and legislative recommendations to ensure nothing like Jan. 6 ever happens again. But it’s unclear how much of its investigative material will be released to the public.

In one of eight hearings last summer, Maryland Rep. Jamie Raskin, another Democratic member, said, “We have only shown a small fraction of what we have found.”

Lawmakers have made clear that the report will lay out what they view as the stakes for the country as many Republicans still believe, falsely, that the 2020 election was stolen and as Trump considers another run in 2024.

“With every effort to excuse or justify the conduct of the former president, we chip away at the foundation of our republic,” Cheney said at the hearing.

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Associated Press writers Jill Colvin and Eric Tucker contributed to this report.

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More on Donald Trump-related investigations: https://apnews.com/hub/donald-trump

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COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — Republican state lawmakers involved in Ohio’s political map-making process appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court on Friday, seeking a review of an Ohio Supreme Court decision finding the state’s latest round of congressional maps unconstitutional.

The move by Ohio Senate President Matt Huffman, Ohio House Speaker Bob Cupp and a state senator and representative who also sit on the Ohio Redistricting Commission was foreshadowed when the group flouted an August deadline they’d been given by the Ohio Supreme Court to redraw the boundaries.

In a statement, the GOP lawmakers called the high court’s July 17 decision rejecting a second proposed congressional map as gerrymandered to GOP partisan advantage “fundamentally flawed.” Their petition to the U.S. Supreme Court asserts the ruling encroached on their legislative authority “in multiple ways.”

“While many believe that the Ohio Supreme Court majority misinterpreted state law, there is also the broader concern that the Court assumed a role the federal constitution does not permit it to exercise,” they said.

The head of one of the groups that brought suit against the maps criticized the appeal.

“This is more hypocrisy and theater from the leaders of the Ohio General Assembly, because this fringe legal theory they’re quoting doesn’t even apply in this scenario,” said Jen Miller, executive director of the League of Women Voters of Ohio. “The Ohio General Assembly exercised its authority when it helped develop the constitutional amendment that changed mapping processes and gave the Ohio Supreme Court the authority to strike down district maps.”

Cupp, a former Ohio Supreme Court justice, has advanced the legal theory behind the appeal. In an open memo this summer, he asserted lawmakers could ignore the deadline set by state-level justices and move on to the federal court because the case is a matter of federal interest. He said they had 90 days to do so, which falls on Monday.

He did not address why that approach was not taken back in January, the first time the Ohio Supreme Court rejected a congressional map. By waiting, Cupp’s timeline carries a mapmaking process that was supposed to conclude in 2021 close to the retirement date of Ohio Chief Justice Maureen O’Connor, the seven-member court’s swing vote.

A 4-3 majority has delivered Democratic and voting-rights groups victories over five Statehouse maps and two U.S. House maps. Nationwide, these maps are required to be redrawn to reflect population changes in the 2020 Census.

With litigation still pending, the state’s 2022 legislative and congressional primaries went forward under those same invalidated maps. The latest congressional map delivered two-thirds of Ohio’s 16 seats to Republicans, although the state’s party breakdown over the past 10 years was roughly 54% Republican, 46% Democrat.

This is Ohio’s first time implementing new mapmaking systems approved by voters as constitutional amendments, and what happens when mapmakers fail to comply with court orders has been a matter of debate. So far, justices have stopped short of holding them in contempt.

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How are mail-in and absentee ballots verified?

Whether a state requires voters to request an absentee ballot or participates in universal mail-in voting, all ballots cast by mail or dropped off at a drop box are vetted to ensure their legitimacy.

Election officials log every mail ballot so voters cannot request more than one. Those ballots also are logged when they are returned, checked against registration records and, in many cases, voter signatures are on file to ensure the voter assigned to the ballot is the one who cast it.

Still, mail ballots are one of the most frequent targets of misinformation around voting, despite fraud being rare.

Different states have different ballot verification protocols. All states require a voter’s signature, while some states have additional precautions, like having bipartisan teams compare that signature to a signature on file, requiring the signature to be notarized or requiring a witness to sign.

In Arkansas, you must return proof of voter registration or a copy of your ID with the ballot. In states including Georgia, Minnesota and Ohio, you have to submit your driver’s license number or state ID card number, which will be compared with voter registration records before your vote is counted.

In states that require voters to submit applications to receive absentee ballots, the application typically includes several pieces of identifying information to ensure you are who you say you are. In some cases, that includes a copy of your photo ID.

In almost every state, mailed ballots can be tracked online through a unique bar code on the envelope, allowing voters to watch the movement of their ballot until it is counted. Ballot security features and ballot sorting at election offices help weed out any counterfeits, though election officials say fake ballots have not been a problem in U.S. elections. A Georgia investigation into allegations of counterfeit ballots in the 2020 election found no evidence to back up the claims.

Secure ballot drop boxes are placed in public locations and emptied only by trained election staff, to prevent anyone else from tampering with the votes inside.

As with other forms of election fraud, harsh penalties for voter fraud by mailed ballot act as another deterrent. Depending on the circumstance, voter fraud charges can result in a fine, prison time or both.

Despite widespread claims of mail-in and absentee ballot fraud, the reality is it’s exceedingly rare. The Brennan Center for Justice in 2017 ranked the risk of ballot fraud at 0.00004% to 0.0009%, based on studies of past elections.

Meanwhile, a May 2022 Associated Press survey of states that allowed the use of drop boxes in the 2020 presidential election found no cases of fraud, vandalism or theft involving drop boxes that could have affected the results.

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The AP is answering your questions about elections in this series. Submit them at FactCheck@AP.org.

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By Andrew Chung

(Reuters) -The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday rejected former President Donald Trump’s bid to have an independent arbiter vet classified documents that were seized by the FBI from his Florida home as part of his legal battle against investigators probing his handling of sensitive government records.

The justices in a brief order denied Trump’s Oct. 4 emergency request to lift a lower court’s decision that prevented the arbiter from reviewing more than 100 documents marked as classified that were among the roughly 11,000 records seized at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach on Aug. 8.

There were no publicly noted dissents by any of the nine justices to the decision, which came two days after the U.S. Justice Department urged them to deny Trump’s request and keep the classified documents out of the hands of the arbiter, known as a special master.

The court’s 6-3 conservative majority includes three justices appointed by Trump, who left office in January 2021.

Federal officials obtained a court-approved warrant to search Trump’s residence in a Justice Department criminal investigation after suspecting that not all classified documents in his possession had been returned after his presidency ended.

Investigators searched for evidence of potential crimes related to unlawfully retaining national defense information and obstructing a federal investigation. Trump has denied wrongdoing and has called the investigation politically motivated.

Trump went to court on Aug. 22 in a bid to restrict Justice Department access to the documents as it pursues its criminal investigation.

U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon last month agreed to Trump’s request to temporarily block the government from using the seized materials in its investigation until the special master determined if any could be deemed personal or subject to attorney-client confidentiality or executive privilege – a legal doctrine that shields some White House communications from disclosure – and thus off limits to investigators.

Cannon, who was appointed to the bench by Trump, named retired U.S. Judge Raymond Dearie as the special master. Cannon later refused a Justice Department request to partially lift her order relating only to the documents bearing classified markings of confidential, secret or top secret, which the government argued was impeding an effort to mitigate national security risks from their possible unauthorized disclosure.

Cannon said she could not accept that the documents were indeed classified without review by Dearie.

The Justice Department appealed to the Atlanta-based 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which then put on hold Cannon’s decisions related to the classified documents, an action that prevented Dearie from vetting them while letting the government resume its probe. The 11th Circuit noted the importance of limiting access to classified information and ensuring the department’s probe would not be harmed.

The 11th Circuit also rejected any suggestion that Trump had declassified the documents – as the former president has claimed – saying there was “no evidence” of such action and that the argument was a “red herring because declassifying an official document would not change its content or render it personal.”

The three statutes underpinning the search warrant used by the FBI at Mar-a-Lago make it a crime to mishandle government records, regardless of their classification status.

The department’s investigation also seeks to determine who accessed classified materials, whether they were compromised and if any remain unaccounted for.

Trump’s lawyers previously told the Supreme Court that Dearie should be able to vet the records and that the Justice Department has “attempted to criminalize a document management dispute and now vehemently objects to a transparent process that provides much-needed oversight.”

(Reporting by Andrew Chung in New York; Editing by Will Dunham)

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By Moira Warburton

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A group of U.S. Senate Democrats sounded the alarm over a lack of election workers ahead of the Nov. 8 midterm voting, citing threats and harassment as hurdles to recruiting crucial staff.

In an Oct. 6 letter to the U.S. Election Assistance Commission, 13 Senate Democrats and two independents aligned with Democrats called for the federal agency to step up efforts to support states in recruiting workers needed to run next month’s midterm elections.

Voters will cast ballots across the United States in races for Congress, governor and many other state and local positions. Republicans are optimistic of seizing control of the U.S. House of Representatives and possibly even the Senate, which are narrowly controlled by Democrats currently.

“Recruitment efforts have been further hampered by the increase in threats and harassment targeting election workers,” the letter stated. “We urge you to take additional actions to ensure election officials have the information and resources necessary to address these ongoing shortages.”

The letter cited states such as Texas, which have been forced to close polling stations due to a lack of staff.

Threats against poll workers have sharply increased since the lead up to the 2020 election, when former President Donald Trump began making unfounded claims about massive election fraud.

Since then, numerous court cases, non-partisan audits and even Trump’s Department of Justice rejected his claims.

At least ten states are considering stronger protections for election administrators who have faced a campaign of terror inspired by Trump’s baseless claims of a “stolen” election in 2020.

Reuters documented more than 850 threats and hostile messages to election workers and officials nationwide in a series of investigative reports.

(Reporting by Moira Warburton in Washington; Editing by Richard Cowan and Alistair Bell)

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By Trevor Hunnicutt

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Joe Biden will sign an executive order on Friday pushing federal officials to drive prescription drug costs down during a pre-election trip designed to promote Democrats’ health policies, an official said.

The order requires the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services (HHS) to outline within 90 days how it will use new models of care and payment to cut drug costs, according to the White House official, who declined to be identified previewing the president’s action.

Biden plans to sign the order during a trip that includes stops in California on Friday and Oregon on Saturday as he positions his party as a champion of lower healthcare costs ahead of Nov. 8 midterm elections at a time that inflation ranks among voters’ top concerns.

Data on Thursday showed U.S. consumer prices leapt 8.2% in the 12 months through September, after peaking above 9% in the summer and growing at their fastest pace since 1981. Healthcare costs were partly to blame in the most recent month, along with food and rent.

“Americans are squeezed by the cost of living – that’s been true for years and is a key reason the president ran,” the White House said in a fact sheet to be released on Friday that blames pharmaceutical companies for raising prices. “Health care costs in particular are driving inflation.”

HHS was given the power to promote new approaches to lowering costs and widening care through an Innovation Center, created by a 2010 healthcare reform law known as Obamacare and housed at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

In August, Biden signed a $430 billion Inflation Reduction Act, authorizing the federal government to negotiate prices on some prescription drugs and cap costs for the government’s Medicare health program.

Some 65 million Americans are enrolled in Medicare programs, which have repeatedly come under fire for its cost to taxpayers.

(Reporting by Trevor Hunnicutt; Editing by Robert Birsel)

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SAVANNAH, Ga. (AP) — Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock and his Republican challenger, Herschel Walker, will meet Friday night for their only debate in Georgia’s marquee Senate contest, just days before in-person early voting begins.

The 60-minute session, which will take place before a live audience, comes in the wake of reports that Walker paid for a girlfriend to have an abortion in 2009 before later fathering a child with her. Additionally, the matchup could force both men to answer other attacks — personal and political — that have flooded voters’ television screens and social media feeds for months.

“Raphael Warnock will have to answer why he has voted 96% of the time with (President) Joe Biden, giving us record-high inflation, all while doubling his own income,” Walker aide Will Kiley said, previewing now-familiar assertions from Republicans.

Warnock’s campaign manager, Quentin Fulks, wrote in a memo that the debate will highlight Walker’s “pattern of lies, disturbing behavior, and positions” that “prove he is not ready to represent Georgia in the U.S. Senate.” Fulks added, however, that Warnock would highlight his nearly two years in the Senate as proof he “will work with anyone to help the people of our state.”

Those previews track ground that Warnock, the 53-year-old pastor of Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, and Walker, the 60-year-old former college and professional football star, have staked out in a midterm election that will help determine which party controls the Senate for the final two years of Biden’s term.

Warnock and fellow Georgia Democrat Jon Ossoff won their Senate seats in a January 2021 special election two months after Biden won Georgia by fewer than 12,000 votes out of 5 million cast. That was the first time in two decades Democrats won federal elections in the historically-conservative state, raising questions about whether Warnock can replicate his victory in a midterm election, especially with Biden’s popularity down among Georgia voters.

Walker has seized on that landscape, caricaturing Warnock as a rubber-stamp for the administration. Warnock’s answer has been to emphasize legislative accomplishments in Washington, with a focus on provisions he sponsored capping insulin and other health care costs for Medicare recipients, Democrats’ extension of the child tax credit and infrastructure provisions that Warnock shepherded with Republican colleagues.

A major variable in the debate is how aggressively Warnock chooses to directly attack Walker on various allegations and disclosures that have surfaced throughout the campaign. The senator typically has defaulted to his broad assertion that Walker is ill-prepared for office. But debate moderators could inject more details of Walker’s past.

Recent reporting by The Daily Beast disclosed records of an abortion receipt and a subsequent personal check from Walker to a woman who said the celebrity football icon paid for her abortion when they were dating. Walker, who as a candidate backs an outright national ban on abortion, continues to deny the reports, even after the woman identified herself as the mother of one of his four children.

Other reports, including from The Associated Press, have detailed how Walker has exaggerated his academic achievements, business success and his philanthropic activities, as well as accusations that he threatened the life of his ex-wife that go beyond details Walker himself acknowledged in a 2008 memoir and subsequent media interviews. Walker also acknowledged three of his children publicly for the first time only after earlier Daily Beast reporting. Before his Senate bid, he’d spoken publicly only of Christian Walker, his adult son by his first wife.

Walker, as is typical of challengers battling incumbents, has proved much more eager to go after Warnock directly. Citing Warnock’s Senate financial disclosures, Walker blasts Warnock as using the Senate to get rich. Warnock reported income from a book deal after his Senate election. He also reports a monthly housing allowance from Ebenezer Baptist Church in excess of $7,000 — an arrangement that allows Warnock to continue receiving a considerable annual sum from the church for his role as senior pastor without violating federal ethics rules capping senators’ outside income.

National Republicans, meanwhile, have recently aired ads highlighting Warnock’s personal life. One ad references a March 2020 incident in which Warnock’s then-wife, Oulèye Ndoye, told police he ran over her foot with his vehicle. Police records state that officers found no evidence that Warnock did so. The couple divorced before Warnock’s election to the Senate; they share two young children.

Walker himself has avoided attacks on Warnock’s family life, though he campaigned earlier this week with Sen. Rick Scott of Florida, who chairs the Senate GOP’s campaign arm that paid for some of those ads.

The Savannah debate, coming days before Monday’s start of early in-person voting, is the two rivals’ only meeting because Walker declined to accept the three fall debates typical in Georgia campaigns. Warnock accepted that slate of proposed debates in June, only to have Walker balk and counter with Friday’s debate. The Friday debate will not include Libertarian Chase Oliver, who did not meet organizers’ polling threshold.

Just one of those original three debates is still scheduled: Warnock will meet Oliver in a Sunday session sponsored by the Atlanta Press Club. In that debate, Walker will be represented by an empty podium because he declined the invitation.

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Barrow reported from Atlanta.

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