LOS ANGELES.–Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), 69, told NBC’s “Meet the Press” host Kristen Welker that 78-year-old President Donald Trump should avoid the showmanship and focus on 59-year-old Vice President Kamala Harris bad policies. “The provocateur, the showman, may not win this election,” Graham said, urging Trump to stay on message because Kamla’s views on key campaign issues are so bad or don’t exist at all. Kamala’s reluctance to stake out contrasting positions from Trump stem from her poll-driven decisions, not certain how the public responds, especially on controversial topics like inflation and foreign policy. Graham knows he’s the last person, based on his own personal experience, to advise Trump how to run a presidential campaign. Graham and other Republicans haven’t admitted his loss to Biden in 2020 had to do primarily with Covid-19, not Trump’s campaign style.
NBC, one of the many networks opposed to Trump, has nothing good to say about the former president, barely able to contain their egregious bias on national TV. Welker puts Graham on her show thinking he’ll say something controversial about Trump’s campaign, mainly that his flamboyance hurts his chances to win the election. Actually, Trump’s charisma and flamboyance is precisely why Graham and other Republicans were not match for Trump in 2016, 2020 and 2024, winning all the Republican primaries without wasting his time on media-driven debate stages. All the GOP attacks on Trump for acting cowardly all backfired with GOP primary voters sticking with the former president because he’s the most entertaining campaigner in modern U.S. history. Graham knows that Trump has endured the most vicious assaults from Democrats and the press.
NBC likes to hear the Trump’s superior campaign rallies and entertaining style could wind up boomeranging, only wishful thinking for media conglomerates pushing the Harris campaign. “President Trump can win this election. His policies are good for America, and if you have a policy debate for president, he winds. Donald Trump the provocateur, the showman, many not win this election,” Graham said, giving NBC some hope. But Graham knows that Trump the showman contrasts himself constantly with the failed Biden-Harris policies that brought the country the highest inflation rate in over 40 years, robbing everyone, especially the middle class, of any employment gains over the last four years. “I’m looking for President Trump to show up in the last 80 days to define what he will do for the country, to fix broken borders, to lower inflation,” Graham said.
Everyone wants to tell Trump how to campaign but Graham and other critics know that Trump knows what he’s doing, even if every word is denigrated by Democrats and the press. Once Kamala began to share some of her economic plans, the country gasped, wondering how she came up corporate price-gouging and price-and-cost controls. Kamala’s poll-driven ideas play to only the most impoverished groups, completely ignorant to how the economy works. Trump doesn’t hesitate for a second to point out Kamala’s current plans or her past ideas that have a proven track record of failure. “I’m looking for President Trump to show up in the last 80 days to define what he will do for our country, to fix the broken borders, to lower inflation,” Graham said. With her latest economic plan, Kamala shows why she’s reluctant to commit to any proposal because she can’t run away from the Biden-Harris track failures.
Graham said he needs to go on the campaign trail for Trump with former GOP candidate, former U.N. Amb. Nikki Haley. Haley had be critical of Trump during the 2024 primary campaign but joined forces with the Never Trump GOP movement, led by former House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), who, for whatever reason, despises Trump. Graham wants to see Haley, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and Virginia Gov. Glen Youngkin campaign vigorously for Trump in battleground states. “Me and Nikki need to go to Georgia,” Graham said. “We’re giving advice on TV to President Trump. He’s got a lot of critics. He’s got a lot of advisers, but to Nikki Haley and DeSantis and Youngkin and all these great people we have, let’s get together and actually campaign for the guy,” said Graham. Graham wants the GOP to get over their pettiness and realize Kamala would be a disaster for the country.
Graham wants Trump to focus more on policy than personal attacks on Kamala if that’s possible. “I don’t have a lot of respect for [Harris] intelligence, and I think she’ll be a terrible president. And I think it’s very important that we win, and where the personal attacks are good, bad, I mean, she certainly attack me personally,” Trump said at a Pennsylvania rally. Graham doesn’t have to worry about Trump not raising legitimate campaign issues because he continues to highlight all the Biden-Harris policy failures. But Kamala’s personality and tendency to cackle wildly doesn’t present the most presidential image to foreign leaders. If there’s going to be any progress in foreign policy, how’s Kamala supposed to pull that off when she’s half the problem? “Every day we’re not talking about her policy choices as vice president and what she would do as president is a good day for her and a bad day for us,” Graham said.
About the Author
John M. Curtis writes politically neutral commentary analyzing spin in national and global news. He’s editor of OnlineColumnist.com and author of Dodging The Bullet and Operation Charisma.
