U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham looked at the choices at the top of presidential ballot Tuesday, considered his party’s nominee in Donald Trump, and one of his party’s primary villains in Hillary Clinton, and, according to a tweet he made later afternoon, opted for options number 3.
“In the prez race, voting for Hillary Clinton was always a non-starter and I couldn’t go where Donald Trump wanted to take the USA & GOP,” he noted in one tweet.
In another, he wrote: “I voted @Evan_McMullin for President. I appreciate his views on a strong America and the need to rebuild our military.”
In recent days, McMullin has been given a chance to win a state, and therefore it’s electoral votes. The state in which he is considered to have a chance, however, is Utah, not South Carolina. Graham, a vocal advocate for U.S. defense, has been in the senate since 2002 and is among the higher profile Republicans in that chamber.
Graham, though, has never been particularly high on Trump’s candidacy. In September, he criticized Trump for failing to apologize to President Barack Obama over Trump’s years long advocacy of the “birther” movement. Trump helped lead an effort that questioned whether Obama’s birth certificate was a forgery, alleging that the president was born outside the United States and was therefore ineligible to be president. Trump in September said he no longer believed that.
Graham at the time noted: “I think the whole movement was unseemly. I had a lot of distaste for it. No factual basis. I think he would be taking the high ground, but that’s up to him.”
Matthew Schofield: 202-383-6066, @mattschodcnews