{"id":3195,"date":"2026-07-12T13:08:15","date_gmt":"2026-07-12T13:08:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nextaddressamerica.com\/?p=3195"},"modified":"2026-07-12T13:08:15","modified_gmt":"2026-07-12T13:08:15","slug":"when-lindsey-graham-was-a-moderate-before-he-went-full-maga","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nextaddressamerica.com\/?p=3195","title":{"rendered":"When Lindsey Graham was a moderate \u2014before he went full MAGA"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

The late Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), who unexpectedly died of a brief and sudden illness on Saturday, once took pride in standing up to extremism within the Republican Party \u2014 at least, before he decided to hitch his political cart to President Donald Trump\u2019s wagon.<\/p>\n

Read more The New York Times runs out of excuses for coddling Trump<\/a><\/p>\n

In a 2014 Politico article that the website recently began recirculating in light of Graham\u2019s death, reporter Manu Raju wrote that \u201cGraham\u2019s deft maneuvering shows why he\u2019s become the dominant political figure in this deeply red state and is skating to another six years even as he\u2019s angered the base on immigration and other hot-button issues. Far from pandering to the party\u2019s tea party wing in order to get reelected, he\u2019s challenging it head-on: Graham warns that the GOP is caught in a \u2018death spiral\u2019 with minorities, says it needs to get real about climate change and defends his move to open debate on gun control legislation after a school massacre.\u201d<\/p>\n

On one occasion, as Politico reported at the time, Graham chastised many of his fellow Republicans for demanding ideological purity tests, saying that instead they should be open to a diverse range of opinions.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat I want is a party that can grow,\u201d Graham said at the time. \u201cWhat\u2019s my big sin: 1-in-10 [votes defecting from the party line]? If we\u2019re going to build the party around universal agreement, we become a club.\u201d<\/p>\n

He also expressed pride in getting lambasted by his own party for supporting immigration reform, even though South Carolina\u2019s Latino population in 2014 was only 5 percent, and warned that the GOP was in a \u201cdeath spiral\u201d with nonwhite voters that would not end unless they did more to advocate for policies that could help minority Americans. He also argued that a conservative message could sell well with racial minorities if the party would stop taking such a hard-line stance on issues like immigration.<\/p>\n

Similarly, Graham expressed a willingness to advocate for issues that he believed involved Americans\u2019 existential futures, even if doing so was unpopular with the GOP base.<\/p>\n

Read more Lindsey Graham\u2019s cellphone destruction remains one of 2015\u2019s most bizarre moments<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cGraham, in the interview, was unapologetic about his unsuccessful attempt to cut a deal with Democrats on controlling climate change,\u201d Politico reported in 2014. \u201cHumans, he said, \u2018to some extent, absolutely\u2019 are contributing to global warming and the GOP needs a rational environmental policy, with a heavy emphasis on nuclear power.\u201d<\/p>\n

By the time Trump became president, however, Graham had flip-flopped on key issues like immigration, climate change and reaching out to minority voters, instead transitioning from a moderate Republican to a staunch MAGA adherent. In return for this evolution, Graham became an influence within the administration, most notably playing a key role in convincing Trump to wage his controversial ongoing war against Iran.<\/p>\n

Despite describing Trump as a \u201cjack—\u201d during the 2016 presidential election (in which Graham ran against him in the GOP primaries), saying \u201cif we nominate Trump, we will get destroyed \u2026 and we will deserve it\u201d and describing him as “the most flawed nominee in the history of the Republican party,\u201d Graham subsequently became a diehard backer of the president and his agenda. Yet after successfully pushing Trump to invade Iran, many in his own party\u2019s base turned against him.<\/p>\n

\u201cLindsey Graham needs to be removed from the Situation Room. I don\u2019t want to hear one word from a guy with no kids, desperately sending our sons and daughters into war on the ground in Iran,\u201d Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) recently wrote on social media regarding Graham\u2019s ongoing support of the Iran war.<\/p>\n

Read more GOP falls in line behind Trump lackey who plans to cover up his Epstein connection<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The late Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), who unexpectedly died of a brief and sudden illness on Saturday, once took pride in standing up to extremism within the Republican Party \u2014 at least, before he decided to hitch his political cart to President Donald Trump\u2019s wagon.In a 2014 Politico article that th…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3194,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3195","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"\nWhen Lindsey Graham was a moderate \u2014before he went full MAGA - Next Address America<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/nextaddressamerica.com\/?p=3195\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"When Lindsey Graham was a moderate \u2014before he went full MAGA - Next Address America\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The late Sen. 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