2020 Election
'Saddest case' Lindsey Graham buried by authoritarian expert for clinging to Trump
June 11, 2023 1:24PM ET
Sen. Lindsey Graham (Photo by Paul Botes for AFP)
According to the author of "Strongmen: Mussolini To The Present," Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) has revealed himself to be a classic example of someone who attaches himself to an authoritarian leader in an effort to be close to power.
Appearing on MSNBC on Sunday morning, with host Ali Velshi, Ruth Ben-Ghiat of New York University dissected the South Carolina Republican's career turn that has led him to be one of Donald Trump's biggest defenders after tweeting back in 2016: "If we nominate Trump, we will get destroyed.......and we will deserve it."
Speaking with the MSNBC host, Ben-Ghiat was asked about Graham's appearance on ABC on Sunday morning where he snapped at the host when pressed on the 37-count federal indictment of the former president and ranted about former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
'Lindsey Graham is a one-man study in what authoritarians can achieve," host Velshi prompted. "This is a guy who hated Donald Trump, he ran against him, he told the world that Trump is unfit to be president, he criticized Trump on January 6th, and now he's talking about the weaponization of government against Donald Trump."
"Yes he even -- I have a photo of it somewhere -- he even had himself photographed watching Trump on television," she replied. "Lindsey Graham is one of the saddest and most significant cases because, before Trump, there was some kind of bipartisan consensus about national security. The two parties differed hugely on domestic things, but with some exceptions, everyone, Lindsey included, were committed to national security."
"Now, with the GOP being an autocratic party in the service of Trump, who is allied with people who want to bring the United States down -- I'm going to say this carefully -- the GOP no longer, and I'm referring to Putin, no longer has the same understanding or commitment to national security and we can see many things going on in that light," she continued.
"It's not just that the documents that Trump had put our nation at risk, it's that this party, which is backing him, now does not have the national security and safety of our country as its main objective, because they are allied with people like Putin who want to take us down," she added.
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