A Vietnam veteran who paid his past-due rent told The Washington Free Beacon that he still faces eviction from a low-income apartment owned by Democrat Sen. Raphael Warnock’s church.
Philip White, 69, told the Free Beacon he was served with a dispossessory notice on Sept. 20 for $192 in unpaid rent by Columbia Residential, which manages a low-income apartment building in Atlanta for Warnock’s Ebenezer Baptist Church.
White provided the news outlet with money order receipts last week showing he paid $542 in rent on Nov. 2, but Columbia Residential has not moved to dismiss, meaning it still intends to evict the two-tour African American Marine veteran. It is unclear why the property management company’s dispossessory notice remains open following White’s rent payment earlier this month.
While Warnock said last month that no one has been evicted from his church’s property, court records show that authorities have issued at least one writ of possession against residents since the beginning of the pandemic.
White said he thinks evictions will resume after Warnock gets past his Dec. 6 runoff election against Republican challenger Herschel Walker.
"He said there would be no evictions," White said. "He knew that was a lie. What he was really saying is there would be no evictions until after the election."
According to the Free Beacon, Ebenezer Baptist Church pays Warnock a $7,417 monthly housing stipend and owns 99% of run-down Columbia Tower at MLK Village. In addition to being Ebenezer Baptist’s property manager, Columbia Residential is also one of the country’s top eviction filers.
On Friday, Walker released an attack ad accusing Warnock of taking advantage of the poor while advancing his own interests through his church’s ample benefits. According to the Free Beacon, the Republican candidate has also offered to pay off the back rents of a number of Columbia Tower residents who have faced eviction since the pandemic started.
White told the Free Beacon he didn’t want Walker’s help.
"I help me,” he said. “I got to tighten my belt and do the things I need to do. If I do that, I'll feel good. I'll sleep better at night, sleep real good."
Warnock accused Walker of tarnishing the name of slain civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. and said his offer to pay the past-due rent balances was a ploy to “exploit” the residents in danger of eviction.
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