President Donald Trump alongside Sen. Lindsey Graham. Image via Jeffery Edwards/Shutterstock.
President Donald Trump and the Republican Party once again find themselves at odds, with Politico reporting that the president's pitch for legislation to honor the late Sen. Lindsey Graham has crashed and burned with his party.
In a Tuesday report, Politico said that Trump's Truth Social post suggesting that Congress pass a "long-brewing" cryptocurrency regulation bill in honor of Graham "struck a false note to many lawmakers," given that much of his legacy as a lawmaker was defined by "American military power, strong global alliances, conservative jurisprudence and more." The report also suggested that the situation shows "how quickly many in Washington are moving after the Republican senator’s death Saturday to claim his mantle for their own purposes."
"Many of Graham’s surviving colleagues instead rallied around a proposal they believe would better honor the four-term South Carolina legend: a bipartisan sanctions bill targeting Russia that Graham had been pushing — and had won White House support for — in the days before he died," Politico detailed. "But it remains unclear if that legislation truly has legs, especially with Trump infatuated with other priorities that have little to do with Graham’s signature issues. That has opened up room for the competing attempts to seize on his legacy."
It continued: "In addition to the crypto bill, Trump stoked a competing suggestion — that the contentious GOP elections bill known as the SAVE America Act could be passed in Graham’s memory — by saying he had spoken to the senator about that legislation just hours before his death. 'He thought we were going to get it passed,' Trump said Sunday on NBC’s 'Meet the Press' — sparking other Republicans, including Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri and Mike Lee of Utah, to redouble their calls for a bill that Graham supported but never played a lead role in advocating."
“I imagine a number of my colleagues will see that as an emotionally compelling reason, one of many, to get this done,” Lee said. "The Senate] reconsider in light of the fact that this was on Lindsey Graham’s mind just moments before he died and we ought to figure out a way to carry forward his legacy by getting this thing passed.”
Many Republicans, however, remain committed to passing new Russia sanctions in Graham's memory, given his history as one of the Senate's "fiercest Russia hawks." So important was the issue to him that he had just returned from a trip to Ukraine before his abrupt death. The bill, Politico explained, was "put on ice" numerous times over the years when Trump opted to try and negotiate with Vladimir Putin directly instead.
“The most obvious and logical way [to honor Graham] would be the sanctions bill, because it’s his bill,” Sen. Kevin Cramer, a North Dakota Republican, said on Monday. “You’re not making anything up. He practically died trying to get it passed… Anything else becomes kind of political trickery in my mind.”
