Sen. Lindsey Graham is taking fire from the Right and the Left, a development that has placed the South Carolina Republican in a political quagmire as a challenge to his reelection bid heats up.
Jaime Harrison, Graham’s Democratic opponent, raised more than $20 million during the first six months of the year — enough to mount a credible Senate bid in states far larger than South Carolina. Less than eight weeks before Election Day, Harrison is using that war chest to flood television airwaves and digital platforms with campaign advertising. Graham has never before faced general-election opposition of this magnitude.
Meanwhile, just after Labor Day, Graham, 65, came under attack from Fox News host Tucker Carlson.
The highly rated television commentator, who has cultivated a loyal following among grassroots Republicans, used his prime-time perch to blame Graham for President Trump’s problematic interview with veteran Washington journalist Bob Woodward. Trump acknowledged privately to Woodward that the coronavirus posed grave risks to the United States even as he minimized the threat to the public. Carlson, bewildered that Trump would talk to Woodward, suggested it only happened because Graham brokered the interview.
Terry Sullivan, a Republican operative and veteran of South Carolina politics, said Graham is often most comfortable in the eye of a storm. “He likes to be in the thick of things,” Sullivan said, adding: “I’ve worked with hundreds of politicians in my life, and Lindsey Graham, hands down, has the best political instincts of any of them.”
Harrison, 44, has raised tens of millions from grassroots Democrats across the country. The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee plans to add to Harrison’s pile of cash with a limited expenditure of coordinated funds, a show of confidence in his prospects.
Harrison is using his war chest to fund a robust voter turnout program, albeit the operation is virtual in reaction to the pandemic. The Democrat also has tried to be creative, forming “Harrison Helps,” a charitable effort to assist families in financial distress because of the coronavirus. To rebuff claims by the Graham campaign that he is trying to avoid debates, Harrison plans Monday to announce he has accepted invitations to four faceoffs with his GOP rival.
“We’re talking about the issues impacting South Carolinians, while Lindsey Graham is playing political games in Washington,” Harrison campaign spokesman Guy King said.
The contest is still Graham’s to lose.
Even as Trump’s provocative populism has pushed Charleston and surrounding communities toward the Democrats, the Republicans have acquired more support up the coast, around Myrtle Beach, and in growing enclaves upstate, just south of Charlotte, on the South Carolina side of the state line with North Carolina.
The Graham campaign is confident that once voters tune into Harrison’s liberal positions on critical issues such as healthcare and the environment, the senator will lock down more than enough support to win. On that front, the Graham campaign expects the battle between the two parties for the Senate to be a chief selling point, saying even disaffected Republicans who plan to vote for Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden prefer a GOP-controlled Senate.
“The more South Carolina voters hear about how liberal Jaime Harrison is, the less they want him anywhere near the Senate,” Graham campaign spokesman T.W. Arrighi said.
