- Sen. Lindsey Graham told Axios on HBO that he still thinks Donald Trump is good for the GOP.
- Graham said Trump has a “dark side” but also a “magic” that other Republicans do not have.
- He said Trump could make the GOP stronger and more diverse, but that he “could destroy it too.”
- Visit the Insider Business Department for more stories.
In an interview with “Axios on HBO” that aired Sunday, Senator Lindsey Graham said former President Donald Trump has a “dark side” and a “magic” that other Republicans do not have.
The senator in South Carolina became a close ally of the president during his four years in office, but does not always follow Trump as some of his loyalists do. While opposing the riot in the Capitol, Graham said Trump “must understand that his actions are the problem.”
When Jonathan Swan of Axios Graham asked why he still supports Trump, the senator said he still believes Trump’s movement is good for the country.
“Mitt Romney did not do it, John McCain did not do it – there is something to Trump. There is a dark side and there is magic,” Graham said. “What I’m trying to do is just use the magic.”
—Axios (@axios) 7 March 2021
Since the siege of the American Capitol by a pro-Trump mob, some Congressional Republicans have been divided on how the party should move forward. While the vast majority voted against accusation, ten representatives voted to accuse and seven senators voted to convict Trump.
Yet Graham told Axios that he thinks the best way for the Republican Party to continue with its agenda is “with Trump, not without Trump.”
“He can make the Republican Party something that no one else I know could make it,” Graham said. “He can make it bigger, he can make it stronger, he can make it more diverse. And he can destroy it too.”
Graham told reporters last month he was meeting with Trump to discuss the future of the Republican Party. He said he wanted to convince Trump to help Republicans take back the majority of Congress in 2022, but that they would need the party to unite.
“If it’s about revenge and checking on people you do not like, we’ll have a problem,” Graham said he would tell Trump.
At the Conservative Political Action Conference last week, Trump called on Republicans who voted for his accusation by name, calling for anger from the crowd.
Trump also told Politico on Saturday that he would be on a trip to Alaska to campaign against Seno Lisa Murkowski, who voted to condemn him and called her ‘disloyal’ and ‘very bad’.
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