McConnell-Graham tensions boil over
by Alexander Bolton - 11/18/22 6:00 AM ET
This week’s bruising leadership fight in the Senate exposed simmering tension between Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), former President Trump’s closest ally in the Senate.
Graham, one of the Senate’s highest-profile Republicans, sharply criticized McConnell’s leadership of the Senate GOP conference during a private meeting this week.
He then told reporters that he voted to elect Sen. Rick Scott (Fla.) as Senate Republican leader because he thought a change was needed.
That earned Graham a sharp rebuke on Twitter Wednesday evening from Josh Holmes, McConnell’s former chief of staff and campaign manager, which some Republican senators saw as punishment for Graham criticizing McConnell’s leadership strategy during the lengthy private meeting at which Republican senators discussed why they fell short of expectations in the midterm election.
And several GOP lawmakers and aides saw it as a sign that senators who challenged and criticized McConnell this week face potential repercussions from the leader’s powerful political network.
Holmes, in his tweets, essentially accused Graham of flip-flopping on immigration reform, a potent issue for many GOP voters.
Graham is positioning himself as a hard-liner on a possible immigration deal in the lame-duck Congress, declaring to Fox News: “There will be no deal on immigration until we secure the border.”
But Holmes, whose firm Cavalry LLC receives money from McConnell’s Senate campaign committee, pointed out that Graham was a leading proponent and coauthor of the comprehensive immigration reform bill the Senate passed in 2013, which provided a pathway to citizenship for 11 million immigrants lacking permanent legal status.
“This dude literally spent the first half of his career championing amnesty,” Holmes wrote above a retweet of a Fox News graphic of Graham talking tough on immigration reform along with the caption “Strong as hell.”
more
https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/3741014-mcconnell-graham-tensions-boil-over/
