Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Newsroom

U.S. Republican Senator Lindsey Graham Has Died. Aired 2:40-3a ET

Aired July 12, 2026 - 02:40   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[02:41:23]

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN Breaking News.

WILL RIPLEY, CNN ANCHOR: I'm Will Ripley and we have breaking news coming into CNN, news that nobody was expecting to hear.

We're learning that longtime Republican Senator Lindsey Graham has passed away. His office says he died on Saturday night after what they call a brief and sudden illness. The statement says Graham's family is asking for privacy at this time. He represented the state of South Carolina in the U.S. Congress since 1995.

Let's bring in CNN's Elex Michelson, anchor of "THE STORY IS".

Elex, you are on the West Coast there. How are you processing this news that has just come in, the shocking death of a senator who had just been in Ukraine and had just met with the Ukrainian president? And now we're learning he has died.

ELEX MICHAELSON, CNN ANCHOR, "THE STORY IS": Yeah, I mean, just posted a bunch of statements onto X yesterday in his official capacity. Pictures and images of him working over the last few weeks are out there.

So this coming out of nowhere that Lindsey Graham, one of the most important and influential voices in the United States Senate for many years, somebody who has been one of the biggest champions of more United States military intervention, somebody who has championed the idea of military intervention in Iran for many years, somebody who's championed the United States relationship with Israel very closely for many years.

And now all of a sudden, you know, there's been so much conversation about Mitch McConnell's medical reality right now. Nobody would have thought this would come now. It's been an extraordinary life of public service, a controversial life.

Somebody who was in the United States House of Representatives for many years, been in the Senate for many years as well, became a close ally of John McCain and Joe Lieberman. They called themselves the three amigos and viewed themselves as sort of mavericks within the Republican Party.

And then he ran for president in 2016 and said very negative things about Donald Trump at the time, but then would become one of President Trump's greatest allies just this week, posting on social media that he was the goat of all presidents and has been a steering force more recently of President Trump's military intervention in Iran.

So, you know, there are 100 senators. Not all of them stand out. Lindsey Graham is somebody who has stood out for a long time and has been one of the most important members of that body for many, many years.

RIPLEY: And he just turned 71. June 9th, he won the South Carolina Republican primary seeking reelection for Senate. Nobody expected that he wasn't going to continue traveling, wasn't going to continue pushing the causes that are important to him.

Although, as you mentioned, those priorities and those causes have certainly changed over time. Some have sort of wondered, what is Senator Lindsey Graham's center? Do you think we ever really, really knew that?

[02:45:05]

MICHAELSON: I mean, I think one thing that you've seen over the years was that he clearly felt that an activist foreign policy and being a champion of the military and more military intervention is something that he's been talking about for decades, especially the Iran issue. And we've seen what's happened with that in the last few months as well.

But that has been sort of the criticism of Lindsey Graham over the years, what you're talking about. But what he's also been very, very adept at as a political practitioner was getting himself in a position of power and influence and kind of knowing where the winds were blowing within the Republican Party and heading there. And in the process, giving himself an ability to survive politically, to win election after election, and to increase his seniority in the Senate, and to have more power for the people of South Carolina.

I mean, there -- this will certainly, you know, South Carolina is a solidly Republican seat. It's hard to imagine, you know, a flipping of South Carolina, North Carolina in a bit of a different place. But it's a bit early to start talking about the political realities of what happens next, as we all, I think, are just in shock at the idea that Lindsey Graham has suddenly died and also reflecting on a life of decades of public service.

RIPLEY: And he was just in Ukraine. He was just meeting with the Ukrainian president. What did he accomplish on that trip? And assuming from what we saw in all of the videos, the statements that he was making, he appeared to be in very good health, just in unusual form.

There was certainly no outward indication that there was anything physically wrong. His office saying this was a very brief, sudden and brief illness, they said in their statement. MICHAELSON: And we don't know what that means, because he was posting

about President Trump's trip to NATO and conversations that he was having with folks about that, like two days ago.

So how brief was this illness? We don't know what exactly that means. Is that a heart attack?

You know, at this point, I think a lot of it would be speculation to try to think about that. But yeah, I mean, Lindsey Graham, by every indication, was working up until the very last day and certainly putting out a public image that there were no issues at all.

And he was very much involved in the job as a senator from South Carolina, especially on the job of the foreign relations of the United States.

RIPLEY: And a very strong ally of President Trump, who also really knew how to turn on the Southern charm. So even when he was talking about some of these contentious and controversial issues, there was something -- something very charming about Lindsey Graham. He was a likable guy from people that have met him, people that have interviewed him. And they found him to be a very unique character, a unique personality in Washington.

MICHAELSON: Yeah.

RIPLEY: And he, I think, really liked the media and had a longstanding relationship with many folks in it. I remember interviewing him myself back in 2016 when he was running for president. And it was stunning how anti-Trump his language was, warning about what would happen if Donald Trump became president.

And then, of course, after he became president, he became one of his closest allies. They would often golf together, President Trump and Lindsey Graham, and joke around on the golf course. I mean, for anybody that's met Donald Trump, he too is a very charming guy.

And the two of them would go back and forth in terms of jokes with each other. And I think both of them, as people who sort of appreciate politics, were able to get over all those insults that they went back and forth on and have a very productive working relationship for each other. You know, Lindsey Graham was somebody who helped to deliver for President Trump in a lot of ways in the Senate.

And President Trump was very helpful for Lindsey Graham's career. As we've seen, I mean, he, as you mentioned, he won the South Carolina primary because there wasn't a real challenger.

President Trump, as we've seen in the last few months, can endorse challengers to Republican primary opponents in the Senate and essentially end the careers of Republican senators in the process.

[02:50:11]

He did that with John Cornyn in Texas. He did that with Bill Cassidy in Louisiana. He's been a supporter of Lindsey Graham. So they were able to move past their past problems and develop a very strong working relationship. And I think Lindsey Graham is one of the senators from all the reporting that President Trump was actually in touch with most in the United States Senate as somebody who would work with him on formulating strategy on how to get things done.

RIPLEY: And President Trump certainly loves a turnaround story. Somebody who is at one point a very contentious critic and they're trading bars back and forth. If that person then turns around and starts to praise President Trump, as Senator Lindsey Graham often did and praised him very effusively in public, and often President Trump values that relationship and he takes care of those people.

I'm curious, though, what your impressions were back in 2016 when you interviewed Lindsey Graham and he was running for president. What struck you about his personality, his values, the issues that he was fighting for that were important to him as a retired member of the U.S. Armed Forces, as a senator from South Carolina, and as somebody that was trying to appeal to the broader American public and run for president at that time?

MICHAELSON: Yeah, I mean, that was a -- that was a different time. That Republican primary had so many different voices.

And then President Trump sort of upended the establishment at that point. Lindsey Graham was a part of the old establishment. But he was somebody who was warm, funny, enjoyed a back and forth with the media, I think inviting.

And it was, I mean, I remember an incident where President Trump put his phone number out and encouraged people to kind of call and harass him. There was like a lot of weird stuff that happened during that period.

But when you would see Lindsey Graham, and I've covered him also in the Senate over the years and in the hallways there, I mean, he was one of the most accessible senators in terms of his media access, in terms of sharing his perspective, being willing to go on the record and to talk to people, which obviously, as a reporter, we certainly appreciate because the alternative is not great.

And he was somebody who had tremendous, tremendous influence in that body. He knew where the bodies were buried in Washington. He knew how to wield power. And he knew how to get a lot of what he wanted.

And from a foreign policy perspective, in especially the last six months or so, you've seen a lot of what Lindsey Graham has been pushing for years and years come to be. And that, you know, some of that is what Lindsey Graham has done publicly in terms of going on camera, doing interviews with people like me and others, Manu Raju, everybody else.

And some of it is what he's done privately in developing that relationship in lobbying President Trump. And I think there's real debate about whether some of those outcomes have been positive or negative. I think it depends on your perspective.

But regardless of your perspective, I think it is very clear that Lindsey Graham was one of the most effective senators at getting what he wanted and one of the most influential members of a body of 100. He was one of a handful that really, really stood out in terms of his influence.

RIPLEY: He was also known as a dear friend to Israel. And in fact, there's just been a post on X from the national security minister in Israel saying that Israel lost one of its greatest friends, said Senator Lindsey Graham stood with Israel, not because it was easy, but because he believed it was right. His unwavering support, courage and moral clarity earned him the admiration of millions of Israelis. The post goes on to say the state of Israel will always remember his friendship, his unwavering support and his steadfast commitment to Israel's security.

And then the post continued by sending condolences to Graham's family, saying may his memory be a blessing. That's from Israel's national security minister. So obviously, the repercussions of this are going to be felt around the world, but particularly in the Middle East, where obviously Senator Graham has been a huge supporter of the war effort alongside Israel in Iran.

So how does that now going to factor into all of this?

(CROSSTALK)

[02:55:02]

RIPLEY: -- Strait of Hormuz?

MICHAELSON: Yeah, I mean, he had a longstanding and close relationship with Benjamin Netanyahu, the prime minister of Israel, who has been a major force in sort of American politics for decades at this point in different roles for Netanyahu and different roles for Lindsey Graham as well.

Lindsey Graham has led many trips to Israel, including the video that you're looking at right now from February, where he is meeting with Benjamin Netanyahu and talking about their joint interests. Obviously, Israel and Benjamin Netanyahu pushed very hard for military conflict with Iran. And Lindsey Graham helped to lobby for that because of the shared understanding and shared agreement on that principle.

A big part of what Israel has felt over the years is that Iran is an existential threat to Israel, which is why Netanyahu has for many years and Lindsey Graham for many years has warned about the risk of a nuclear Iran and pushed for having more military intervention there. It'll be interesting to see if there is another voice in the Senate that has that same commitment. It's hard to imagine somebody, especially because of Lindsey Graham's decades of working on this issue.

And it'll be interesting to see what happens in South Carolina in terms of the replacement there. You know, the margins in the Senate are not very wide at this point.

And you have a situation now, especially where Mitch McConnell, we do not know about his health. We really don't. And he has not come to the Senate anytime soon. Now Lindsey Graham is not going to be there.

And you have several senators that President Trump has targeted endorsing their opponents who are not going to be returning to the Senate, but are now in the Senate. And that's going to make legislating in the Senate very complicated right now, as the Republican majority is like this. I mean, it's really, really tight, which is going to be making getting anything done in that body very challenging for some time, certainly for the next few weeks, if not months.

RIPLEY: And you mentioned Mitch McConnell. There was footage exclusively obtained by CNN in recent days of him being taken out of his home in a stretcher, put into an ambulance. That has been the focus, certainly on the Internet.

People have been talking about with conspiracy theories about Mitch McConnell. And then out of the blue, I don't think there was anybody, Elex, that was expecting for the news to break in the middle of the night on Saturday in the United States that Senator Lindsey Graham has died. It's a shocking and extraordinary development that nobody saw coming, given the fact that he had just returned from an overseas trip meeting with Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the president of Ukraine.

MICHAELSON: No, nobody saw this coming. And it's -- I mean, you feel for his family, you feel for his loved ones as well. And I feel a little bit crass even talking about the political realities, because this whole thing is so fresh.

But that is something that some people are going to be thinking about right now, in terms of where does this leave the United States Senate. And the truth is, it leaves a hole. I personally, frankly, because I just found out about this, and this is the middle of the night.

I don't know the rules in South Carolina, in terms of replacing a senator, that something will look up in the minutes ahead. I literally just jumped onto this. So I'll do some research into what the process is.

Every state has a little bit different process for that. But we'll all sort of become experts in that. But for the time being, I think it is important to reflect on an extraordinary life of public service and somebody who has an outsized influence in the United States.

And the real questions certainly, Will, as you're bringing up from a foreign policy perspective, which is your area of expertise, you know, where does this leave the United States of America? And I'm curious, from your perspective, as somebody who spent so much time reporting overseas, and so much time looking at these issues, how Lindsey Graham was viewed around the world.

RIPLEY: We're going to get into that. We're just going to do a quick reset.

So, just stay with us, Elex, because for viewers who are just joining us, we're going to bring folks up to speed as it's now the top of the hour.