The New York Times thinks that there is a case to be made for Herschel Walker. An article published by the paper states, “He could still win.” The same article makes a case for Raphael Warnock and states “the runoff is Warnock’s to lose.” At this point in the race, either point can be true. The run-off for the Georgia Senate seat is tight, tight, tight and no one knows how it will turn out on December 6.

The key to the run-off is voter turn-out. That’s always the case for elections, of course. The winning candidate turns out the most voters. In this race, there is a special group of voters for which both campaigns are competing. Both Walker and Warnock need the split ticket voters from the general election. Thousands of voters chose to vote to re-elect Governor Brian Kemp and then voted to re-elect incumbent Democrat Senator Raphael Warnock. It made no sense but it happened and neither candidate won the necessary 50% of the vote to avoid a run-off.

So, with the split ticket voters in mind, both campaigns are courting suburban voters, the ones credited (or blamed) for the run-off. The important thing for the Walker campaign is to keep Republican voters motivated to get out and vote. The race is winnable.

One thing that is not helpful to Republicans who want to defeat Raphael Warnock and give the Senate a 50/50 split so that committees are equally comprised of both Republicans and Democrats and will slow down and help defeat Joe Biden’s radical agenda is what current Georgia Lt. Governor Geoff Duncan is doing. He is trying to torpedo Walker’s campaign. How? He told CNN that ‘The Republican Party deserves better than Herschel Walker.’ Ok. He’s not the only Republican with that opinion. But then he admitted that he went to vote, stood in line for an hour to do so, and then once he was ready to cast his vote, he couldn’t. He left without voting for anyone in the run-off race.

Duncan is one of the highest-ranking Republicans in Georgia. He’s an anti-Trump Republican. Walker was recruited to run by Trump and Trump endorsed his candidacy in the GOP primary race. None of this sits well with Duncan. He condemned Walker during the primary in October. He said Walker “won the primary because he scored a bunch of touchdowns back in the ‘80s and he was Donald Trump’s friend.” Duncan’s term ends in January and he didn’t run for re-election. What does he have to lose by speaking out?

Still, Duncan wouldn’t say whether he would vote for Walker – until this week. He said he waited in line for an hour at a busy polling site in Forsyth County, got to the touchscreen pad and couldn’t back Walker or Democratic U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock.

“It was the most disappointing ballot I’ve ever stared at in my entire life since I started voting,” Duncan told CNN. “I had two candidates who I just couldn’t find anything that it made any sense to put my vote behind. So I walked out of that ballot box, showing up to vote but not voting for either one of them.”

Duncan added more to his public opposition to Walker with the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

“Like many conservatives across Georgia, I’ve been waiting for Herschel Walker to give me a reason to support him. Regrettably, he hasn’t, and that’s why I was forced to leave my ballot blank,” said Duncan.

“Georgia deserve better than Sen. Warnock, whose left-wing voting record is way out of step with their priorities and would never earn my support,” Duncan added. “The Republican Party deserves better than Herschel Walker. To rebuild, we need less team players and more team leaders.”

I get it. Both candidates are very flawed and yet there is no way I’d vote for a Democrat. How are you a Republican and not do what you can to stop Joe Biden’s agenda for the next two years and help a Republican win the White House in 2024? Duncan’s ego and Trump hate have taken over and he apparently feels the need to publicly virtue-signal how pure he is when it comes to politics. Is that being a leader? Don’t Republican leaders inspire voters to pull the lever for the most conservative candidate? What about Ronald Reagan’s 11th commandment?

Duncan brings out the very worries that Governor Kemp and other top Republicans have in helping get out the vote with split ticket voters. There are about 200,000 of those voters. Those voters delivered a victory for every statewide Republican candidate except for Herschel Walker.

Warnock is going hard for the split-ticket voters. He brought in Dave Matthews for a concert that had a good turn-out and it was mostly the very suburban voters both candidates need to win the run-off. Walker’s team dismisses Duncan’s bid for attention.

Walker’s allies dismissed Duncan’s move as an attention-grabbing attempt to stay relevant. Stephen Lawson of the pro-Walker 34N22 PAC said the lieutenant governor simply wanted to “remind everyone just how enormous his ego is.”

“But just like CNN, a Democrat announcing he isn’t voting for Herschel Walker isn’t news.”

Walker campaign manager Scott Paradise also shrugged off Duncan’s defection: “Imagine caring so little about your day job that you can waste an hour in line to accomplish nothing. Georgians will sure miss Geoff.”

(Paradise’s wife is slated to be the top aide for incoming Lt. Gov. Burt Jones, a Republican whom Duncan refused to endorse ahead of the midterm. Lawson is also an adviser to Jones.)

Duncan hasn’t said what his next career move is yet but it likely isn’t in politics, especially if he helps tank Walker’s campaign.

“Hopefully this serves as a wake up call to conservative Republicans across our state and our country that the quality of our candidates does matter,” he said. “It is no longer good enough to just win the first half and a primary, we need to win the game in a much different general election setting.”

Candidate quality matters. We all know that. Sometimes a voter just has to pick the least bad option. In this case, stopping Biden’s agenda in the Senate should be the top priority for Republican voters in Georgia.