204. Why Lindsey Graham’s Death Will Change Trump’s Agenda
37m 51s
Lindsey Graham’s political journey exemplifies the transformation of the Republican Party under Donald Trump, shifting from a globalist, pro-Ukrainian ally of John McCain to a pragmatic collaborator with Trump. His moral compromise—calling Trump a "race-baiting xenophobe" before golfing with him—has left a tarnished legacy, illustrating the cost of political survival in a Trump-era Washington. Meanwhile, ICE operations have escalated, with over 10,000 detentions in one week and fatal shootings, such as the 52-year-old Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, who was not even the intended target. The use of racial profiling and the phrase "resembled the target" fuels fear and is now weaponized in political campaigns, especially in Texas. Despite efforts to keep these operations under the radar, widespread video footage and public outcry are exposing systemic violence and racial targeting. The episode links these issues to a deeper crisis: a breakdown in trust, accountability, and democratic norms, where political power is prioritized over justice. As both Graham’s legacy and ICE’s actions highlight, the U.S. faces a moral and institutional crisis that challenges the values of fairness, human dignity, and American identity. The growing public awareness, driven by media and citizen reporting, suggests a potential shift in political discourse and public resistance.
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Welcome to the Restless Politics U.S.
I am Anthony Scaramucci.
I'm Anthony Scaramucci with Caddy K.
Caddy, how are you?
You look like you're in a television studio.
Yeah, I've just stepped right out of a television studio.
But I'm a little disappointed in your T-shirt, Anthony, because you have a T-shirt saying
world.
The only T-shirt anyone can be wearing right now is this T-shirt.
I have an England T-shirt.
I was just wearing it on Morning Joe.
Well, I have a vintage jersey from 1990.
Then you need to be putting that on and you do not need to take it off between now and
Wednesday.
You're now with us.
You're on Team England, Anthony.
I got bullied a little bit by Alistair Campbell, but I'm going to put it on next time you see
me.
So here's what we're going to talk about today.
We're going to talk about Lindsey Graham and the unfortunate and untimely tragic death
of Lindsey Graham, but also what it means for the party, but who Lindsey Graham was
and actually what he represented to the Republicans and what the arc of his political career was
31 years in the Senate.
And then we'll talk a little bit about ICE, Caddy, and we're going to talk about the situation
where we've got a lot of immigrants.
Immigrant communities in intense scrutiny.
And even though it's dialed down from a media perspective, the president and his team are
still going after people and it's put the United States on the human rights watch list.
So those are going to be the two big topics we're going to talk about that, of course,
if you for members only, we'll be addressing things like the New York Times subpoenas and
some of the things that are going on around the world.
But, Caddy, let's start with Lindsey Graham.
You knew Lindsey Graham.
I saw you interview Lindsey Graham.
I saw it.
I saw him on Morning Joe with you.
You've been to parties with Lindsey Graham.
Who was and who is Lindsey Graham?
I've known and worked with Lindsey Graham for years and interviewed him many times.
I mean, dozens of times in my career in Washington.
And I've interviewed him because he was one of the senators who was interested in the rest of the world.
So when I was working with the BBC on the news side, BBC was a useful outlet for Lindsey Graham.
So, of course, as it was for Marco Rubio, our paths crossed because he always wanted to make sure that he was on the news.
He was reaching audiences around the world.
He wanted to be able to impact things in Ukraine.
And so I had a lot to do with him.
And in many ways, Lindsey Graham represents for me the arc of the Republican Party in the era of Donald Trump.
He goes from somebody who was a hawk and a conservative from South Carolina,
but who was an ally of John McCain, trying to make sure that they did things around torture in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan,
stuck his neck.
out there, trying to get comprehensive immigration reform when he felt that that was popular in the era of Obama.
He tried to work across the aisle to get climate change policy on cap and trade, a tax on carbon emissions.
And then Lindsey Graham sees the Tea Party coming in the Obama era.
He sees that America is changing and he starts to become more conservative.
He drops the immigration work.
He drops the climate-related work.
And he starts shifting himself.
In 2016, of course, he runs against Donald Trump, but runs ferociously.
I mean, he has some of the most excoriating things that anybody has said about Donald Trump.
The way to make America great again is to tell Donald J. Trump to go to hell, was his famous line.
But then he becomes an ally of Donald Trump.
But what's interesting, so he is a shapeshifter.
He's a political shapeshifter.
But behind that shapeshifting,
that what had brought me initially into contact with Lindsey Graham,
his commitment to American leadership,
his desire to get things down on the world stage,
his antipathy towards Russia and his very strong support for the Ukrainians,
that stayed.
And I think those people who are criticizing Lindsey Graham today and saying,
listen, this is a guy who totally lost his values,
they will quite quickly see how valuable he actually was
in trying to get him to go to hell.
And I think that's what's so interesting about him.
I think he's a guy who's trying to maneuver Donald Trump around the edges to be more pro-Ukrainian,
to do things to help the Ukrainians.
So he's such an interesting character.
He was funny.
He was incredibly smart.
But I'm sure you knew him as well, Anthony, that you had things to do with him too.
What do you make of that arc that he went through, that journey he went through?
Gatti, I met Lindsey Graham for the first time in 2007.
I had gotten invited to Davos, Switzerland, and I had been a Republican.
I had been a Republican fundraiser.
I'd never met him before.
And there was an event in Davos.
John McCain, Senator John McCain from Arizona, Lindsey Graham from South Carolina,
were giving a presentation on U.S. foreign policy.
And so I signed up for it, and I went to it.
And they said that, you know, they said Iran was minutes away from having a nuclear weapon.
It was 2007, 19 years ago.
I said, oh, wow, this has got to be a huge deal.
Iran is minutes away from having a nuclear weapon.
So that's been our chant.
For two decades.
But I remember him being a globalist, and I remember him being a U.S. Truman Doctrine,
Ronald Reagan continuation of the American story and the American help for Western liberal
democracies and other nations that were believers in freedom.
And then the shift started to happen.
I also remember when I was with.
Jeb Bush working on the campaign when Donald Trump gave out Lindsey Graham's cell phone number because he was trying to say Trump had given money to all these people.
And, of course, you give enough money to a politician, you get the cell phone number.
And, of course, Donald Trump gave out his cell phone number.
And Lindsey Graham smashed it on TV and got himself a new phone.
And he was lighting Trump up.
And everybody in the Republican Party goes through that carousel, myself included.
So I stand also accused of some of that hypocrisy.
So what happened?
What happens is you hate on Trump.
You think he's mad.
You try to deal with Trump.
And then you either realize he's completely mad and you have to denounce him or you do what Lindsey Graham did, which is you equivocate to try to get on side with Donald Trump to see if that's a better solution politically.
And so we can sit there and criticize Lindsey Graham.
That's what he did.
But that's frankly what politicians do, Caddy.
So we can sit here and sneer at him.
I'm not.
I'm not one of those people.
I will say that he will be missed.
Ukraine will miss him.
Yeah.
And Zelensky has already come out.
Right.
And he spoke from Zelensky to a bunch of reporters on the phone saying, I have the OK from the White House to put the secondary sanctions on those countries that are importing oil from Russia, that are importing Russian oil.
So he felt he was making progress.
And Zelensky clearly felt he was making progress.
I think Zelensky will miss him.
He will miss him.
I think.
I think Israel will miss him as well, because at the end of the day, even though he was a cipher of Donald Trump's, he was still in the camp of trying to fight for these people's types of freedoms.
And so when I got bounced from the White House, I got a chance to speak at the Republican.
It's like the Jewish Congress, the RJC was out in Vegas.
Sheldon Adelson actually invited me to be keynote speaker.
I sat with Lindsey that day and I was watching that metamorphosis take place.
And frankly.
as a Republican, a former
Republican. We all went through a metamorphosis with Trump. But I think it cost Lindsey in the
end. I think that that was a soul tearing for Lindsey Graham. I don't think Lindsey Graham
slept well at night thinking about the juxtaposition of what Trump was doing to America,
what Trump was doing to the world, and what him and John McCain's view of those things were.
This is the guy that called him a race baiting, xenophobic, religious bigot back in 2016,
and then goes to play in golf with him all the time. There is no way that it didn't weigh a
little heavy on him. And actually, I remember John McCain saying just before he died about
Lindsey Graham, because the two had been very close, the three amigos of John McCain,
Joe Lieberman, and Lindsey Graham trying to get things done. Those were the days when actually
Republicans would work with Democrats. I mean, he's also a reminder of an
interesting time in his life. He's also a reminder of an interesting time in his life.
of American politics that has just gone. There is none of that comedy. But he, John McCain,
they've had a huge falling out because of Lindsey Graham going over to the Trump side,
and John McCain never did. And John McCain said, well, I hope he feels it was worth it.
I mean, that's a devastating thing to say to somebody who has been such a good friend of yours.
I don't think Lindsey slept well as a result of that. But I will say this,
that in Trump's world, in Trump's Washington, and by the way,
I stand accused. And so I have to own everything in life. I think it's the best way to do it.
I called Trump the president of the Queens County Bullies Association. And then I went on to become
his communications director. And I tried to stay loyal to him, by the way. I didn't break from
Trump until 2019. And I'm in a better place for it. And Lindsey would have been in a better place
for it if he actually broke from Trump. But I think the legacy of this is in Trump's Washington.
The shadow over Washington and the world for a decade plus. But in Trump's Washington,
the currency, Caddy K, the currency was proximity. And Lindsey Graham knew that.
And so he was going to do whatever it took to have a proximate closeness to Trump.
And I think it cost him morally. And I think it cost him from a whole perspective. And I just say
for other politicians out there, it is not worth it. He should have listened to his mentor, John McCain,
and backed off of Trump. And history will judge Lindsey unkindly, unfortunately. And that's sad
for me because I liked him as a person, but he'll be judged unkindly.
So I think history will. And I want to talk, though, a little bit more about the Ukrainian
side of this, because I think Ukraine is the one area where you could make the case that the moral
compromise, the personal compromise that Lindsey Graham went through from having called him race
baiting and xenophobic.
Four hours of golf with him a weekend. And that is perhaps the case where you can say there was
emerging, particularly in this second term, a strong isolationist wing, much stronger than
there had been in the first term, a strong isolationist wing of people around Donald
Trump in senior positions and in the influence world. But I'm thinking particularly people like
J.D. Vance, right, who had this antipathy towards any engagement with Europe. We saw it in the
White House, which was more open to dealing with Russia. You had the Steve Witkoffs, you had the
Jared Kushners, also more open, particularly in Steve Witkoff's case, much more open to dealing
with Russia, maybe didn't fully understand the complexities of trying to negotiate with Vladimir
Putin. And Lindsey Graham, who had been in the Senate for a long time and is an expert. I mean,
Donald Trump is surrounded by people on the foreign policy side, apart from Marco Rubio,
who are not experts, who don't really know.
And I think we're seeing the fallout of that from Iran and from the negotiations with
Russia. But Lindsey Graham knew that. And maybe you can make the case that given what was at stake
in Ukraine, and all of the European countries would probably agree with this, you wanted to
keep Donald Trump on board as much as was possible on the Ukraine war and keep him putting pressure
on Russia. I don't know if this sanctions act goes through now, the second term, but I think
if the secondary sanctions act goes through. But to his credit, Lindsey Graham never gave up on that.
And he was calling reporters from Kiev and saying, listen, I'm excited. I finally got
the White House to agree with this. We can do the secondary sanctions. So a lot of people have
compromised with Donald Trump. A lot of people have had to put their own feelings and their own
values. And John McCain was pretty scathing about Lindsey Graham. But maybe if Lindsey Graham was
the counter to J.D. Vance.
Actually managed to get something through that helped the Ukrainians on his multiple visits to
Kiev, perhaps it was worth it. I mean, perhaps does he, Antony, provide a blueprint in some ways
for how people who are more in favor of America's global leadership need to act? I mean, does it,
I don't know, does this just, whether he, now we're going to see Lindsey Graham is gone. And
maybe he can't hold the post his death. He, you know, can't hold the line anymore, but
he did keep, he did provide something of a model perhaps, didn't he?
In some ways, Katty, but I mean, he's a study in human nature and human weaknesses,
and he's a study in transparency, because ultimately, if you want to serve yourself
and you want to be next to the powerful and you want to feel significant, you sort of do what
Lindsey Graham did. You know, when you spend five years in a prisoner of war camp serving your country
and you don't get to serve yourself, you're not going to get to serve yourself. And so, you know,
give up your fellow citizens who are servicemen in that prison of war camp.
In the case of John McCain.
In the case of John McCain, and you come back, you're like, hey, I'm not, I'm not doing that.
And I did a hybrid of that. So I actually understand both sides. I went in, tried to
help Trump, became impossible. I did still try to stay loyal to him. And when that also became
impossible, I denounced him. They would have all been better off getting together and saying, hey,
this is a really bad guy. He's really bad for America. And he's doing a lot of existential
damage. They're sitting there. The fuse is burning. They all know what I'm saying is true.
Fuse is burning. Rome is burning. And they're like, okay, well, hopefully Rome won't completely
burn down by the time this guy leaves. But that's, that's the problem with that whole scenario.
Well, I think it's interesting to see that the people who are going to run to replace him,
because there's going to have to be a special election to replace Lindsey Graham. But the
people who are running are running from the right. They're not running from the, his,
traditional American global leadership position. That's another thing he would say, well,
if it's not me, it'll be someone further to the right of me. And that's why I'm,
that that's the equivocation alibi in your own brain as you're trying to apologize to yourself
for doing the things that you're doing. But there's a paradox of momentum here in Ukraine.
And just briefly, you know, on Friday, the day before he died, Graham, Blumenthal, and Wicker,
the senators got together and basically said that they had the support now.
A group of senators, by the way.
But they had the support. And I think his death, to, pursuant to what you were just saying earlier
about him finally getting Trump to sign on, his death may accelerate that. So there's a paradox
here. This may be actually short-term good for Ukraine and what's going on in terms of the
pressure that can be put on Russia. I think you also, if you're pro-Israel,
and you're losing somebody like Lindsey Graham, you got to say to yourself, okay, that's,
that's not great. But you also have people like Cotton and Cruz and Wicker that are also
pro-Israel. So I feel like there's a deeper bench for Israel, okay, in the United States Senate.
There's a deeper bench, but I don't think either Cotton or Cruz quite have the president's ear in
the way that Lindsey Graham did. I mean, he invested a lot of time on that golf course
and he came back. I mean, another moment, right? You had January the 6th. Lindsey Graham says the
next day, I'm getting off the Trump train. I'm not, I'm, I've had enough. This was,
the president was not, you know, did not act well on that day. And then of course
he gets back on the Trump train. And I think Trump, you know, belittled him in public, but
he did spend an awful lot of time with him. And to the extent that there was
a conduit from the White House to the Republicans in the Senate, it went through Lindsey Graham.
It didn't go through Ted Cruz. There's not much, you know, not much love loss between
Ted Cruz and Donald Trump. He hasn't done that work that Lindsey did. Didn't have that mannerism
that Trump seemed to appreciate. So I, I think this is a very bad day for Netanyahu. I think
there are a lot of more bad days for Netanyahu coming, but I do think losing Lindsey Graham is
a bad day for Netanyahu. One other thing quickly that I, it's worth talking about. I think we just
want to put it to rest. The number of conspiracy theories that I heard from smart, sensible people
within minutes of hearing of Lindsey Graham dying, that he had just come back from Kiev. He must have
been poisoned.
Was it the Russians who poisoned him? Was it the Israelis? Was it Mossad that poisoned him? It was
wild out there for a while. I think that is all Antony being put to rest. This was a heart attack.
He said he wasn't feeling very well. He had been going to go on television on Sunday and he said
he'd go to a doctor after that Sunday. Of course he never, a television appearance, of course,
he never managed to do that. And then Kash Patel comes out and says, all of the resources of the
onto the flames of conspiracy theorists.
if the FBI is getting involved, there must be something worth investigating. And this was
nefarious. I'm sure you heard some of that too. But I think the medical reports now put that to
rest. You texted me last night that Kash Patel is not a serious guy. I mean, just
what FBI director would have done that years ago? But he's a podcasting, beer guzzling FBI director.
And so he's going to do that sort of stuff exactly to get attention. But
Katty, before I know we're going to switch to our other topic, but if you had to put five or
six sentences together related to Lindsey Graham, and I don't know if you saw the economist obituary
of him, but I thought it was thoughtful. They said he represented the whole arc of the Republican
party over the last 25 years. But if you had to put five or six sentences together about Lindsey
Graham, what would they be?
Look, I think Lindsey Graham,
was somebody who had dedicated his life to the US Senate, to the institutions of the US Senate,
and had serious policy positions, believed deeply in America's global leadership,
believed in the alliance of NATO, felt that Russia was a bad adversary and wanted to protect Ukraine,
but also persuaded himself that in the era of Donald Trump, the only way to get anything done,
was to cooperate with the president, to make nice to the president, to suck up to the president.
And in the end, it is that inability of his, that moral failing of his to stand against Donald Trump
in the way that we know he believed was right, that will mean he will go down in history with
a tarnished legacy.
I think that sums it up. I mean, you know, all right, well, let's go to the break. And then
when we come back, we'll talk a little bit about what's going on with ICE.
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Welcome back to The Rest Is Politics US.
I wanted Anthony to talk a little bit about what is happening with ICE around the country.
Of course, you and I did.
A lot on this in January when everything blew up in Minneapolis.
It's one of the reasons we want to go to Minneapolis on our live tour in October
to talk about how that was the center of the political world for a moment
and had such a legacy.
But actually, there has been quietly, not in the way that we saw with big troops on the streets
in California or in Minneapolis, but there has been quietly in the last few weeks
a huge escalation.
In the number of people in this country who are being detained and put into detention centers
to be deported by ICE.
I mean, we've had something like 10,000 people were detained in the last week of June alone.
My reporting is that there has now been quotas sent out from the White House again.
Last year, the quotas were 3,000 a day.
Now they're down a little bit, but the White House is still pushing the Department of Homeland
Security.
And ICE to pick up 2,000 people a day.
I'm hearing it anecdotally.
You know, I spend a lot of time out in Virginia.
People are starting to talk about it again.
They're starting to have to coordinate.
They're afraid to go to work again.
We've seen this awful shooting down in Houston, Texas of the father of three American children
who was shot in circumstances that the DHS described in one way that this guy was weaponizing
his car.
That seems to be.
The stock phrase that they're using at the moment.
But we're now getting, including today, new video showing that actually the car was not
damaging the ICE vehicles at all.
These were unarmed ICE vehicles that were chasing him.
And I think it's reemerging into the American people's consciousness that Stephen Miller
is very serious about this.
We had a bit of a lull after Minneapolis because that didn't reflect well and they were losing
public support.
But this summer they are picking back up.
And people are being picked up and people are being killed.
And the guy that was killed in Texas, Lorenzo Salgado Arajo, a 52-year-old who'd lived in
the country for decades, he wasn't even the person they were trying to pick up.
He just was the wrong guy in the wrong place who they said looked like the intended target.
Looked like the intended target is the key phrase because basic word means he was Hispanic.
So they went to the police.
They went after him and he was shot in his car.
And there have just been a lot of new cases of this happening again.
So what are you making of what's happening, Anthony?
And do you think it's going to start getting the kind of political attention that it did
when it happened in Minneapolis?
Kenny, before I give you my take, I just want to ask you a follow-up question on some of
those facts.
So the first approach that Miller took was a high media approach.
Look at what we're going to do.
Rough, rough.
Cover your face.
Let's beat up everybody and let's show people how tough we are.
That backfired.
And so now he's taking a non-media approach.
They're not tipping the media off to where they're going and what they're doing.
And it's a little bit more like special forces, if you will.
I'm not going to say the SS, but there you go.
I just said the SS.
They're trying to creep around to punish people.
And so I guess my question to you, is that working?
There's been 10 fatal shootings and probably something like 21 in total of people that
have actually been shot at.
When they shot those two in Minneapolis in front of the cameras, there was a revulsion
to it, but there doesn't seem to be an American revulsion to what they're doing right now.
So before I give you my take, is it working?
So last year, I guess I would say that ICE wanted headlines and this year it wants numbers.
And in a way that is much more clinical.
Because what they want is to keep it below the radar.
They are hoping that they can get away with picking up 2,000 or 3,000 people a day,
quietly putting them in detention centers and getting them out of the country.
Now, as far as we know, these are not the worst of the worst.
This guy was the father of three American citizens.
He's been working in America for a long time.
He does not seem to have any criminal record that would suggest that he was a bad guy.
But they still want the numbers.
So that means you have to pick up kind of everybody and you have to shed your net wide.
I think the reason that they won't be able to carry on getting away with this quietly
is because people are reporting on this, even though the agents in the case of Mr. Araujo,
Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, didn't have body cameras, which we had been told was going to be a change.
The ICE officers were meant to have body cameras.
But I think the reason that this is not going to work out for them quietly is because they
haven't been able to get away with it.
I think the reason that they haven't been able to get away with it is because they have
the same problem of competence and lack of training of these ICE officers.
We have 20 people dead because these citizens are not going to be able to get away with it.
situations escalate quickly. Cars move fast. They shoot into cars like they did with Rene Good. They
kill the person in the car. That then starts to make news. They aren't training the ICE officers
to de-escalate situations. Now, if you think about police officers, they spend years being
trained to de-escalate. So I think we're going to see more deaths. We're going to see more of
this kind of incidence of the wrong people being killed. And that is going to get headlines. So I
don't think they're going to be able to do this. And it's part of the reason I wanted to talk about
this today. I don't think they're going to be able to do this and shove it under the carpet and hope
that American citizens don't notice. I mean, I think we have a situation with the number of
people being arrested and the cack-handedness with which it's being done and the trigger
happiness of these ICE officers where we are just waiting for another American citizen.
I think they are. Yeah. This new move and this new tactic has been very successful for them
because when you have less footage, Katty, you have less resistance. Okay. So it's been
politically more effective for them. But now we have the footage because the footage of this one
in Texas is coming out because everything is filmed. People are filming it on their cameras.
I understand that, but they've been able the last six or so weeks, five or six weeks,
they've been able to do this. They've arrested 10,000 people pretty successfully. Now it's
creeping up. But remember in this country, and I always say this too, you got to follow the money
in this country. If you put $70 billion, $70 billion, Congress funded ICE through the end
of the term, it's not a policy debate anymore. It's an appropriation reality. And so when that
happens, they're bulled up. We got money to spend and we're on a mission. Now, if you talk to,
CEOs, and you talk to business owners, restaurant owners, business owners, large and small in the
country, they don't like it. Harder to find people to work for you. Harder to get people to come into
the restaurant, work for you, work the farms. You pick the labor in the country. People don't like
it. If they were sitting with Trump or Stephen Miller, they would say, okay, listen, we've got
to defend the border. I understand that we have a welfare state. So therefore we have to protect
the welfare state. We all understand that economically.
But the brutality approach is scaring the daylights out of people and it's making it
harder for people to find qualifiable employment in the country. So I just, I think it's a disaster
actually. And here's the thing. I don't know from a political perspective, and I was dying to ask
you this question. So I'm going to ask you because you're my political consultant. Let's say you're
running for office. Okay. What's the strategy to debate these
guys? And what's the strategy to expose them? What's the strategy to expose them?
And what's the strategy to expose these guys and win over American public opinion?
Let's take this straight down to Texas where this shooting happened. And I think those,
that phrase, an individual who resembled the target, that's how he was described, right? The
guy who was shot, who'd been here for 35 years, shot dead, wasn't even the target, but he was an
individual who resembled the target. You are going to see that phrase pop up on democratic campaign
ads all over Texas.
All over any state where Hispanics turn out to vote, because that phrase basically says
he was Brown. And if you are James Tallarico and you are essentially tied with the Republican
candidate for Senate, Ken Paxton, who has been just filmed by the way, tacky in London with his
mistress on holiday, trying to dodge the cameras. That doesn't look good for him either. Anyway.
Hold on. Can we go to that?
Can we go to that? Did you see that?
Now you're spilling some tea. Is that really what?
Because I saw that. I said, this can't be real. This guy can't be this stupid.
They're walking down the street. It's July the 4th weekend. Ken Paxton, who we've already said
on the program, his wife filed for divorce on the basis of what was it? Biblical reasons.
He was having affairs. And there he is being filmed with this woman arm in arm,
and she's dressed in a swanky dress and they're going out in London. And then they suddenly
realize there's somebody filming them and she tries to kind of disappear behind a billboard
or something with the whole thing. Yeah.
He was filmed in London with his girlfriend, I guess.
This show is the rest is political entertainment.
The rest is political sex. Let's just be honest. So Paxton and Tallarico, they're down in Texas.
They both want to become the next Senator of Texas. They're essentially tied. There's just
been a UT Austin poll, 43-42 Paxton-Tallarico. But the key number is that James Tallarico leads
Hispanic voters by 14 points. So do you think that phrase, an individual who resembled the target,
is not going to show up?
Yeah.
In ads supporting James Tallarico? He doesn't need to win the Hispanic vote in Texas. He just
needs Paxton's ice problem to keep costing Paxton a few points. And Paxton has an ice problem now
across the state. So I think there is political fallout from this. I don't think this story is
going to go away because I think there will always be video. It's clear ice agents are not
wearing video, which they were meant to be wearing body cams. Do you remember that? After Minneapolis,
they said they would start wearing body cameras.
They're not wearing body cameras, but there are enough people with cell phones around
who a moment, I think in areas now, and as the story gets out and more people hear about this,
people will start getting their cameras out because what changed Minneapolis was the video.
Again, I want to tie both of these sections of today's episode together. So Senator Graham,
unfortunately, this is what happens in Trump's America. If you're not pushing back on Trump,
yes, you may have parried.
And push back on him and help Ukraine and the Ukrainian citizens. But if you're not pushing
back on Trump, you're going to end up in a dystopian America that none of us want. And
it's not even what America stands for at this moment in history. So what Trump is clinging to
is a 1947 America. Nobody wants a 1947 America, Caddy, but the people that are around Donald Trump,
maybe there's 10 or 15% of them. And by the way,
nobody wants a wackadoodle, woke culture America either. That's 15% of the people
on the other side of the spectrum. The people in the middle, the 70% of the people
want people to get a job. They want people to feel aspirational. They want their fellow
neighbors not to struggle. And they want there to be some peace in the kingdom. They certainly
don't want ICE agents disputing facts about whether or not the assailant smashed into them with the
car, where the witnesses are saying that didn't happen while they're firing bullets at people.
They don't want that. The normal American, and there are, I guess I'm more or less speaking to
the world right now, there are normal Americans in this country that don't want this. But these
people are very clever, Caddy, in terms of getting what they want without the footage.
And so hopefully you're right. Hopefully this footage now will bring people into the protest
zone again and push back hard on what these people are doing.
I don't like it. I can tell you that much.
Okay, guys, we're going to leave it there. Thank you very much for joining us. We'll
be back, of course, later this week. In our episode for founding members, we're going
to be looking as well at the New York Times journalists who have been subpoenaed by the
Justice Department about a story they wrote about Air Force One. It's a wild story. And I think it
gets to exactly what Anthony was just talking about, how this is such a different era that we
are living in. And this
is a different era.
It's a breakdown of the rule of law. And is this the America that the rest of the world thinks
it should be, that many Americans think it should be?
We're going to leave it there. And we'll be back later this week. Thanks so much for listening,
guys.
We'll be right back.
We'll be right back.
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Podcast Summary
Key Points:
Lindsey Graham represented the evolving arc of the Republican Party, shifting from a globalist, pro-Ukraine, and climate-conscious senator to a political ally of Donald Trump for pragmatic gain.
His close relationship with John McCain and earlier advocacy for U.S. global leadership contrast with his later compromises, raising questions about moral integrity and political loyalty.
Graham’s death underscores a broader crisis in American politics, where political survival often comes at the cost of principled positions, especially under Trump’s influence.
ICE operations have intensified with a focus on detaining and deporting immigrants, including fatal incidents where individuals were shot for resembling targets—highlighting systemic brutality and racial targeting.
The use of non-media, covert tactics by ICE, such as avoiding body cameras and targeting people based on appearance, is undermining public trust and escalating racialized violence.
Political figures are exploiting the ICE controversy in campaigns, using phrases like “resembled the target” to stoke fear and divide communities, particularly among Hispanic voters.
The episode emphasizes that both Graham’s political evolution and ICE’s actions reflect a broader erosion of norms, accountability, and the rule of law in U.S. governance.
Despite efforts to suppress the issue, public outrage, social media footage, and growing evidence will likely reignite national scrutiny and activism.
Summary:
Lindsey Graham’s political journey exemplifies the transformation of the Republican Party under Donald Trump, shifting from a globalist, pro-Ukrainian ally of John McCain to a pragmatic collaborator with Trump. His moral compromise—calling Trump a "race-baiting xenophobe" before golfing with him—has left a tarnished legacy, illustrating the cost of political survival in a Trump-era Washington. Meanwhile, ICE operations have escalated, with over 10,000 detentions in one week and fatal shootings, such as the 52-year-old Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, who was not even the intended target.
The use of racial profiling and the phrase "resembled the target" fuels fear and is now weaponized in political campaigns, especially in Texas. Despite efforts to keep these operations under the radar, widespread video footage and public outcry are exposing systemic violence and racial targeting. The episode links these issues to a deeper crisis: a breakdown in trust, accountability, and democratic norms, where political power is prioritized over justice.
S. faces a moral and institutional crisis that challenges the values of fairness, human dignity, and American identity. The growing public awareness, driven by media and citizen reporting, suggests a potential shift in political discourse and public resistance.
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Lindsey Graham was a long-serving U.S. Senator known for his globalist views and strong support of Ukraine, but he shifted to align with Donald Trump, sparking debate about political compromise and moral decline.
ICE has increased detentions, with over 10,000 people detained in one week alone, and incidents of fatal shootings have raised concerns about excessive force and targeting of minorities.
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