Crowds booed Sen. Lindsey Graham, RS.C., and drowned out his remarks as he rallied for former President Donald Trump in downtown Pickens, South Carolina, on Saturday.
“Well, do you want to find something in common?” the Republican lawmaker asked the crowd at the event.
“I’ve come to love President Trump, and he loves himself, and we have that in common,” Graham added later in his remarks. “And I’m going to help him become president of the United States.”
Graham, who grew up in Pickens County, even pointed out that he was on the Senate Judiciary Committee that helped bolster the Supreme Court’s conservative luster.
Despite this, the large crowd remained unmoved and the boos continued for just over six minutes of Graham’s remarks.
Michael Propes, 60, a resident of Easley, South Carolina, said Graham was trying to side with Trump to breathe new life into his own political career.
“I voted for him years ago, I voted for him last year, but we have to reject him,” Propes said.
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Early in Trump’s speech, he unenthusiastically defended Graham.
“We’re going to love him. He’s half and half. When we need those Liberal votes, we need him. We know the good ones. We know the bad ones too,” Trump said.
Later in his speech, he again mentioned Graham by name and the crowd started booing again.
“I’m going to have to work on these people. He’s there when you need him,” Trump told the crowd. “‘Do you mind if I come down and do a little campaigning for you, Lindsey?’ He was one of my biggest supporters from the start and I appreciate him, Lindsey.”
Other Trump supporters joined in and echoed Propes.
William Billew, 74, said he had had enough of Graham’s “tasteless fatigue”.
“(Graham) doesn’t need to use Trump to get to where he needs to go again,” Billew said.
He felt the South Carolina senator sided with the Democrats when it suited him and pedestalized Trump when it mattered. That made him an unreliable lawmaker, Billew said.
Mike Turnick of Pickens, South Carolina, said Graham’s address was “the low point of the day”.
“He sounded like he wanted to talk more about himself than Trump, I didn’t care about his speech,” Turnick said.
This article originally appeared on Greenville News: Lindsey Graham booed at Donald Trump rally in South Carolina 2024