(CNN)For years, Herschel Walker has told the same inspiring story: that he graduated in the top 1% of his class at the University of Georgia. He's told the story, according to a review of his speeches by CNN's KFile, during motivational speeches over the years and as recently as 2017. The only problem: it's not true.
Walker, who is a candidate in the Republican primary race for US Senate in Georgia, acknowledged in December that he did not graduate from Georgia after the Atlanta-Journal Constitution first reported that the false claim was listed on his campaign website.
But a CNN KFile review found that Walker himself has been repeating the claim for years. Walker's comments in 2017, and others made over the years, show the former football star repeatedly misrepresented his academic credentials.
"And all of sudden I started going to the library, getting books, standing in front of a mirror reading to myself," Walker said in a 2017 motivational speech. "So that Herschel that all the kids said was retarded become valedictorian of his class. Graduated University of Georgia in the top 1% of his class."
"I also was in the top 1% of my graduating class of college," Walker told Sirius XM radio.
Walker did not graduate from Georgia, where he was a star running back after entering as a prized high school recruit. A profile of Walker from 1982 in the Christian-Science Monitor and an article in The New York Times said he maintained a B average at the school. Walker himself told The...
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