Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina continued his recent embrace of charged political rhetoric during a speech Saturday in which he directed the “radical left” to “kiss [his] a**.”
“If you’re the radical left who is trying to destroy this country, you can kiss my a**,” Graham said during a campaign rally for Senator Dean Heller of Nevada.
Graham, a formerly reserved lawmaker, has increasingly employed impassioned rhetoric in attacking his Democratic colleagues and opponents of the Trump administration more generally.
During his speech Saturday, Graham returned to the recent partisan battle over Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation, citing the Democrats’ tactics, which he derided at the time as a “political sham,” as a primary motivation for his campaigning on behalf of his fellow Republicans.
“I’m here for another reason . . . Kavanaugh,” Graham said to applause. “I was pissed.”
Graham emerged as perhaps Kavanaugh’s most strident defender during the confirmation hearings, attacking Democratic lawmakers for “trying to destroy” the nominee’s life for partisan reasons.
“If you wanted an FBI investigation you could have come to us. What you want to do is destroy this guy’s life, hold this seat open, and hope you win in 2020. You’ve said that, not me,” Graham shouted. “This is the most unethical sham since I’ve been in politics and if you really wanted to know the truth, you certainly wouldn’t have done what you did to this guy.”
Following the hearing, Graham was confronted by a protester who demanded Kavanaugh be subjected to a polygraph test to corroborate his denial of ever having attempted to sexually assault Christine Blasey Ford.
“Why don’t we dunk him in water and see if he floats?” Graham shot back.
During a recent appearance on Fox & Friends Graham mocked Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts for presenting the results of a DNA test that indicated she had a Native American ancestor between six and ten generations ago. That segment came after Graham said he doesn’t “give a s**t” if his critics don’t like when he works with President Trump to “make the world a better place” during an appearance on CNN.
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