Former MP David Jolly (R-Fla.) said Monday a trip to Saudi Arabia showed him how Sen. Lindsey Graham (RS.C.) would do anything to secure his political future, including supporting Donald Trump with all his might despite his initial criticism of the then-reality TV personality ahead of the 2016 election.
“I was in Saudi Arabia with Lindsey and at a meeting with the King, Lindsey Graham said to the King of Saudi Arabia, ‘Don’t worry about Donald Trump.’ “Presidents come and go, but senators stay forever,” Jolly, who resigned from the GOP in 2018, told MSNBC’s The Beat.
“That little vignette told me a lot about Lindsey Graham,” the former lawmaker continued. “Someone who probably intends to run for the US Senate rather than retire from the Senate. And so he has compromised and sacrificed his own dignity and political consistency to try to climb the path to power and stay in the US Senate.”
Graham, whom Trump supporters booed and dubbed a “traitor” during the ex-POTUS’ 2024 campaign rally in South Carolina over the weekend, is “symbolic” of the GOP, Jolly said.
Trump has the party “an iron grip,” he added. “It’s post-ideological. It’s complaint. Call it populism if you will. The party has decided to put all the mistakes of Donald Trump behind. He’s her type.”