Beloved or not, Lindsey Graham was a critical dealmaker in Congress

Senator Lindsey Graham during a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington, in 2019. Photograph: Carolyn Kaster/AP View image in fullscreen Senator Lindsey Graham during a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington, in 2019. Photograph: Carolyn Kaster/AP Analysis Beloved or not, Lindsey Graham was a critical dealmaker in Congress Chris Stein Senator played major role in critical negotiations with Democrats and members of his own party on key issues When Democrats and Republicans were earlier this year locked in a standoff that had plunged the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) into the longest partial government shutdown in US history, news of a path forward emerged in the form of a statement from Republican senator Lindsey Graham. Lindsey Graham, key ally of Donald Trump, dies after sudden illness aged 71 Read more By announcing that the budget committee he chairs would set to work on a measure to fund the agencies leading Donald Trump’s mass deportation campaign for the remainder of his presidency, Graham played a major role in rallying the GOP behind a plan that reopened DHS . It was a familiar role for Graham, whose office announced he had died on Saturday at the age of 71 after “a brief and sudden illness”. During his 23 years as senator for South Carolina, Graham developed a reputation as a dealmaker, appearing in the midst of critical negotiations with the Democratic opposition and members of his own party. It was a role he continued in the age of Trump, a leader Graham supported even if he had reservations with his approach to foreign policy. “Lindsey was part of every important policy issue and an indispensable player in every Senate ‘gang’,” said Dick Durbin, the number two Senate Democrat. “He was a fierce Republican partisan one day and a key bipartisan ally the next.” In the public eye, Graham’s reputation as the former often outshined the latter. While he would take part in negotiations with Democrats, he rarely went as far as to buck the White House when it had an occupant from his party. After gaining national renown for harshly criticizing Trump during the 2016 election then transforming into a supporter, Graham was a key player in the Senate Republicans’ failed effort to repeal the Affordable Care Act, and took part in Trump’s attempts to prevent Joe Biden from assuming office after the 2020 election. But his career was marked by repeated instances of working across the aisle to resolve thorny legislative issues, with varying degrees of success. Graham, who served four terms in the House of Representatives before winning election to the Senate in 2002, was a lifelong foreign policy hawk. During the presidency of George W Bush, he was a neoconservative at a time when the ideology was at its most popular, supporting the 2003 US invasion of Iraq and of the use of Guantánamo Bay to house detainees from the war on terror. Yet under the same administration, he became a negotiating partner with liberal icon Senator Ted Kennedy