Opinion: Lindsey Graham serves in Iraq, while facing heat at home
This article was originally on a blog post platform and may be missing photos, graphics or links. See About archive blog posts.
Most senators and House members have spent their summer break tending to politics on the home fronts. A handful have pursued presidential ambitions. And one --- the now-forever-infamous Sen. Larry Craig of Idaho --- took a day to plead guilty to disorderly conduct charges stemming from an embarrassing encounter with an undercover cop in a public bathroom (and then used part of Tuesday to disown his plea).
Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina had other vacation plans. As a colonel in the Air Force Reserve, the Republican served almost two weeks of duty in Iraq, returning just the other day.
He said that while at a trial in Baghdad outside the heavily fortified Green Zone, a car bomb detonated nearby. ‘It’s a dangerous place,’ he told the Washington Post’s Robin Wright in an interview. ‘I carried a 9 millimeter ... and there were several times I was glad I had one.’
Graham has been to Iraq several times previously, both as a reserve officer and on congressional visits. And he insisted progress is evident, in part because of what he interpreted as a growing desire among most Iraqis for a reconciliation among the country’s warring factions.
Politically, Graham has some reconciling of his own to accomplish. His steadfast support ...
for the controversial immigration bill that crashed and burned in the Senate earlier this year --- largely because of intense, grassroots conservative opposition --- has caused some of his fellow South Carolina Republicans to turn on him.
Earlier this month, before he left for Iraq, GOP officials in Greenville County (in the state’s northwest corner) approved a resolution censuring Graham for continuing to ‘adamantly support legalization of illegal immigrants.’ While he was away, a similar measure in nearby Spartanburg County ran aground for procedural reasons. But, according to a local newspaper story, the meeting on the matter illustrated ‘how charged’ Graham’s 2008 reelection bid will be.
The senator stood by his immigration position and was warmly received (one heckler notwithstanding) at a party gathering Monday in the central part of the state. And so far, no heavyweight Republican has committed to a primary challenge. Lt. Gov. Andre Bauer, however, is toying with the idea.
Not so long ago, Graham was an unqualified hero to conservative leaders throughout the country. He was lauded by these activists for his performance as part of the House team that prosecuted the impeachment case against President Clinton in the Senate. That helped him win his own Senate seat in the 2002 election (he was the only member of the impeachment crew to succeed in a quest for higher office).
With that pedigree, if Graham finds himself with anything approaching a serious fight for re-nomination next year, it will provide further evidence of the power of the immigration debate to roil GOP ranks.
--Don Frederick