Sen. Lindsey Graham channeled Miley Cyrus on Sunday in his attack against Donald Trump’s recent immigration comments — deeming his fellow presidential hopeful a “wrecking ball” on the verge of dismantling the Republican Party.
“I think he’s hijacked the debate,” Graham said on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “I think he’s a wrecking ball for the future of the Republican Party with the Hispanic community and we need to push back.”
Regarding Trump’s controversial remarks in which he called some Mexican immigrants “rapists,” Graham said repeatedly that “we need to reject this.”
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“If we do not reject this … we will have lost our way,” Graham said.
The South Carolina Senator called Trump “uninformed” on the topic of immigration and expressed concern over essentially letting the candidate get away with spreading false information about the Hispanic community.
Should the Party refuse to reject Trump, Graham warned, “we will lose and we will deserve to lose.”
This isn’t the first time Graham has sounded off on Trump. On Friday, he said Trump’s comments are going to “kill” the Republican Party.
“Well, I think he said something that has brought people who are frustrated about our immigration system to light, but he also said it in a way that’s going to kill my party,” Graham said.
Republican presidential candidate Carly Fiorina on Sunday didn’t seem as fazed by Trump’s impact, saying that during her six-day visit to New Hampshire, she wasn’t asked one question about his remarks.
“I think Donald Trump taps into an anger that I hear every day,” Fiorina said on ABC’s “This Week.” “People are angry that a commonsense thing like securing the border or ending sanctuary cities is somehow considered extreme. It’s not extreme, it’s commonsense. We need to secure the border.”
Trump has continued to defend the alarming comments he made during his presidential announcement speech last month.
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“When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending the best,” he said during the speech. “They’re not sending you, they’re sending people that have lots of problems and they’re bringing those problems. They’re bringing drugs, they’re bringing crime. They’re rapists and some, I assume, are good people, but I speak to border guards and they’re telling us what we’re getting.”
But Trump’s comments haven’t seemed to deter voters in his Party as he continues to surge in the polls. In a Retuers-Ipsos poll released Saturday, Trump is neck-and-neck with former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, with 15.8% voter support, compared to Bush’s 16.1%.
Meanwhile, Graham has been lagging in the polls, which could keep him out of the first GOP primary debate. Fox News will only give the stage to the top 10 candidates based on a national polling average.
“I’m not responsible for what he says,” Graham said of Trump on Sunday.
However, the Senator added, unless the Party can straighten out the conversation, “we’ve lost the moral authority to govern this country.”
Anna Brand