- Senator Lindsey Graham told Fox News on Tuesday that Republicans should unite under Trump.
- “We have no chance of recovering the majority without Donald Trump,” he said.
- Graham called Mitch McConnell after he scolded Trump for his role in the Capitol siege.
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The Republican Party has remained divided since the January 6 turmoil, but Senator Lindsey Graham has an idea of how to unite it: stay with Donald Trump.
“I know Trump may be a handful, but he is the most dominant figure in the Republican Party,” the South Carolina senator told Sean News of Fox News on Tuesday evening.
Graham addressed his comments directly to Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell, who on Saturday fiercely rebuked Trump for causing the Capitol insurrection.
Graham argued that McConnell’s view of Trump was not “widely shared” by the majority of the party and that McConnell would be wise to realize this.
“Trump is the most important Republican in the party,” said Graham. If McConnell doesn’t agree, Graham added, “he is missing out on a lot.”
Leading Republicans took conflicting positions on how to lead after Trump. McConnell, for example, has distanced himself from Trump since the attack on the Capitol. He joined 42 Republican senators, including Graham, in the vote to absolve Trump in his impeachment trial. But McConnell said over the weekend that Trump “hasn’t gotten away with anything yet” and could face legal consequences as a private citizen.
Trump responded harshly to McConnell on Tuesday, calling the main Republican a “severe, taciturn and serious political hack”.
Graham said the rivalry has shaken him with the future of the Republican Party, which hopes to turn the House and the Senate in 2022 and win back the White House in 2024. Democrats now have a small majority in Congress.
“They are now in each other’s throats,” said Graham. “I’m more concerned with 2022 than ever. I don’t want to eat our own.”
Graham, an important ally of Trump’s during his term, said the former president would be instrumental in winning the elections.
“We have no chance of recovering the majority without Donald Trump,” he said. “If you don’t understand, you’re just not looking.”
McConnell told Politico over the weekend that his main goal was to elect Republicans, regardless of whether they were in Trump’s camp.
“Some of them may be people the former president likes. Some of them may not be, ”he said. “The only thing that interests me is eligibility.”
Last month, when Democrats won two Senate seats in Georgia, Trump became the first president since 1932 to lose re-election, the House and the Senate during his term.