MSNBC mutes Lindsey Graham for ‘hypocrisy’: He would be ‘screaming from rooftops’ if Dems were in bed with Russia

Sen. Lindsey Graham's passionate defense of President Donald Trump was cut short for MSNBC viewers on Wednesday when the network cut off the senior Republican senator.

Graham, who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee, had granted himself all the time he wanted to rail against an FBI investigation into Russian interference in the U.S. elections.

But both CNN and MSNBC quickly dropped the chairman to focus on breaking news in the impeachment of the president.

On MSNBC, former Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-MO) was asked to "fact check" her one-time colleague.

McCaskill said that Graham was behaving as a "good lawyer" for the president.

"He is doing a good opening statement that is trying to take things out of context," she explained. "I know Lindsey Graham pretty well or at least I thought I did. If in fact the FBI was investigating somebody, which they were, [Trump campaign Chairman Paul Manafort] before he came to work on the Trump campaign."

"They were investigating him for getting a lot of money for Russian influence and then he went to work on a presidential campaign and then, lo and behold, the platform gets changed at the [Republican] convention to more fully love Russia," she added.

"Can you imagine what Lindsey Graham would be doing if the FBI had not opened this investigation? McCaskill asked. "Lindsey Graham would be screaming from the rooftops. You've got a Russian guy who has taken millions of dollars from Russia, who's going into the heart of a presidential campaign in the United States."

"Of course you have to investigate," she concluded. "This is such hypocrisy on the part of Lindsey Graham."