On this date in 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, as well as 2018,“Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” published profiles of U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, who made a run at the presidency as well in 2016. In our original profile, we talked about his background as a career military reservist and lawyer who is always spoiling for a war that he never seems to give much thought as to the why or how it will be fought, just that we should ABSOLUTELY fight it. Sen. Graham also is prolifically paranoid, worrying about terror threats both foreign and domestic, from roaming gangs after a hurricane that would require the citizenry to be armed with automatic weapons, or that every nation in the Middle East from Iran, to Iraq, to Syria has developed a nuclear weapon. He also justifies the permanent detainment of people at Guantanamo Bay based off the precedent set by internment camps for Japanese Americans during World War II, which is a pretty dark chapter of American history to use as a guideline, while claiming that Hilary Clinton “got away with murder” during the Benghazi attacks, acting like she was in on the attack on her own friend, Ambassador Chris Stevens. Oh, and speaking of his criticism of Hillary Clinton, he tried criticizing her about her usage of an e-mail server by boasting that he had never written an e-mail (because that’s exactly the sort of tech-savvy guy that should be president). Oh, and he later compared that to the Monica Lewinsky scandal, because e-mails are like getting a blowie from an intern, apparently.
Anyway, during Graham’s run for the presidency in 2016, we covered how he admirably tried defending his amigo, Sen. John McCain’s service record to insults from Donald Trump, and for his trouble, he had his cell phone number given out by Trump, publicly. Sen. Graham’s response was then to release a campaign video of himself destroying his cell phone with several implements (rather than just get his number changed). Graham has frequently been caught lying about facts surrounding 9/11 to shape immigration policy, and through the presidential debates (at least, the “kid’s table” debate he was in because his poll numbers were that awful) continued fear-mongering, using every question about any topic to segue into a discussion of ISIS and declaring, “The world is a battlefield and radical Islam is everywhere.” His response to the terror attacks in Paris, was to insist the United States send 10,000 ground troops to fight ISIS in Iraq and Syria, warning that “there’s a 9/11 coming”. A short time later, though, after Democrats produced some common sense gun legislation, that anyone who is found to be on a terror watch list during a background check should not be allowed to purchase a firearm or explosives (which they could use to carry out a terror attack)… well, Lindsey Graham loves the Second Amendment way more than he hates terrorism, as he voted against it. On two occasions.
Now, here’s the thing about CSGOPOTD and Lindsey Graham… he’s a lot like his old friend John McCain. By which we mean, he’ll pretend to be far more moderate when he has designs on higher office. Around 2015, we saw that more chill Sen. Graham, who would admist the Republican National Commitee “couldn’t run a one-car funeral” after the clusterf*** of a debate plan they had for 2016. Or the time he was speaking before the Republican Jewish Coalition and flat-out admitted that the conservative obsession with being ultra-pro-life was out of hand, because “If you are going to tell a woman who has been raped she has to carry the child of a rapist, you’re losing most Americans.” Yeah, that happened. And how surreal was it to see Lindsey Graham of all people defend peaceful Muslims from the sort of ideas Donald Trump was putting forth, and saying, “Leave the faith alone, go after the radicals that kill us all.” Who was that man? Where had he been for the past twelve years? He actually compared the options of Donald Trump or Ted Cruz as potential presidential nominees as good of an option as being poisoned or being shot, and by February 2016, he admitted the GOP had gone “bats*** crazy” for voting for Donald Trump, and adding “If you kill Ted Cruz on the floor of the Senate, and the trial was in the Senate, nobody could convict you.”
After Donald Trump started making racist statements towards a federal judge of Mexican descent, Sen. Graham advised his fellow members of the GOP to unendorse him, saying, “if anybody was looking for an off-ramp, this is probably it”. Sadly, they didn’t heed his advice, and he can now say things about Trump like, “No one knows where the bottom is at.”
This pattern continued through 2017, as after Donald Trump continually praised Vladimir Putin, Graham remarked, “This election makes me want to move to Canada.” He responded to Donald Trump’s deranged claims about “widespread voter fraud”, telling the public, “I don’t know what he is talking about. If he has evidence, bring it forward. If he doesn’t, he shouldn’t say things like that. He’s gotta realize he’s just not a normal person anymore. He’s not a billionaire TV star — he’s the president of the United States. His words really resonate.” Sen. Graham chided any of his Republican colleagues who might be defending Russia’s hacking of the DNC or their efforts to interfere in the 2016 elections, saying “you are not a patriot” if you celebrate such a thing.
Graham criticized Trump for making a ridiculous claim that President Obama had done “wire-tapps” to his phones, calling on him to apologize or “his credibility will suffer”. On July 9th, 2017, after Donald Trump announced on Twitter that he’s contemplating a joing cyber-security agency WITH Vladimir Putin and Russia, Graham comments, “It’ s not the dumbest idea, but it’s pretty close.”
Graham also gave a less than subtle hint to Donald Trump about how to respond to white supremacists carrying out a terror attack in Charlottesville, to “do more” and to make sure to “dissuade these groups that he’s their friend”. He defended bother Robert Mueller and A.G. Jeff Sessions from Trump’s attacks on Twitter.
However… all good things must come to an end. Just when we thought that perhaps Senator Lindsey Graham might be the last Republican with a conscience… well, we got too close to Graham having to defend his U.S. Senate seat in a GOP Primary in a red state like South Carolina in 2020… and his heel turn came due. And when it arrived, it was pretty f***ing hard to miss. It was in the midst of the hearings to confirm Trump Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh that Graham snapped back hard to the right, digging in on conspiracy theories, and defending an admitted drunk and alleged rapist in a near-spittle-projecting tirade playing out across live cable news broadcasts. He blew off protesters trying to relate their own experiences with sexual assault, coldly telling them, “Go to the cops” rather than stop and listen to them.
Since that day, Graham has been relentlessly partisan, and suckling at the teat of Trump whenever possible, because he’s so loyal to his old friend John McCain that he didn’t even let the body get cold before selling out. He’ll argue against gun control, claiming he needs an AR-15 to “fend off looters during a hurricane”, and spending most of the summer of 2019 lying his ass off about the Trump administration’s concentration camps that hold immigrants, saying “I don’t care if they stay for 400 days” (the legal allowed holding time for undocumented immigrants to be held per the law is 90 days) and for whatever reason, he wanted to make it easier for the Trump administration to keep children locked in cages.
There isn’t an emptier suit in Washington, D.C. than Lindsey Graham. For all his rage and bile, deep down, he’s a coward who stands up for the worst, and inflicts harm upon the most innocent. And that will be his legacy, when all is said and done.