TAMPA, Florida –“South Carolina deserves to have a senator that’s looking out for South Carolina,” former South Carolina Lt. Gov. André Bauer, who is challenging longtime Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), said during an interview with Breitbart News at the Turning Point Student Action Summit over the weekend.
Breitbart News asked Bauer to list a few agenda items that distinguish him from the incumbent senator, whom he hopes to retire.
“Right off the bat, I believe in a 100-percent border security. Look, if we got people that want to come to our country and assimilate, learn the language, be a part of the system, pay taxes, we ought to make it easier,” Bauer began.
“It’s a little hard for people to come in that are trying to do it the right way. And I’m all about people. My great grandparents, my grandfather was a war hero, first American generation, and so we want that. And so that’s a big one,” he said, noting he is opposed to amnesty.
“Secondly, I’m opposed to continuing to send any dollars overseas,” he said, highlighting this major difference between Graham and himself.
“Look, it’s nice to be a good neighbor, but if you can’t take care of your home base, if you can’t pay your own bills, you’re going to be a detriment to everything else. We’ve got to look at this debt,” he said, noting how much it has gone up since Graham has been in office. “That’s not conservatism. That’s not MAGA. And so that’s the two biggest things. ”
“And the last thing is, is South Carolina deserves to have a senator that’s looking out for South Carolina. We don’t see Lindsey Graham anymore. We want a fighter. We want a champion. We want a voice in Washington. We don’t want a voice in Ukraine,” he said, making it clear that — unlike Graham — he is not a globalist.
RELATED — André Bauer: Lindsey Graham Should Have Never Been in Ukraine
“That’s not where we want our senator. That’s not his job. His job is to represent South Carolina, not all Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, Syria, Libya. He’s been in all these conflicts, always wanting to send boots on the ground and regime change,” Bauer said. “I’m opposed to that. I don’t want to see any more American blood put on soil defending somebody else.”
“Look, we’ll help our friends and allies. Drones … the most modern technology. We want to save lives. We don’t want to continue this fight all around the world. And as a conservative, I want to relook at some of the things we’re doing right now,” he said.
In Ukraine, for instance, Bauer believes someone should go in and conduct a forensic audit of where the money went.
“But further, did you know that we have 840 military bases around the world, not on U.S. soil? I tell you this: South Carolina lost two of the most important bases. We had Myrtle Beach Air Force Base. We had Charleston Naval Yard — been there for years. Both of them closed … So we closed two, two right on the border, right on the edge of our country, right on the coast, to protect our coast. We shut those down in order to save money,” he said. “But we left over 800 around the world. Surely there were two around the world we could have shut down before we shut down two in South Carolina.”
“We’ve got over 46,000 troops in Germany. Do we really need that many folks in Germany, one of our greatest allies?” he asked. “I think not. I think you bring those troops home. I think you make sure to protect our border, and you save money and reduce the debt, reduce the spending.”
Bauer also said the Department of Education “has no business in Washington, DC.”
“The people in South Carolina educate vastly different than they do in Vermont. The skill set is different. The workforce is different. … And if you don’t like the education system, you can vote with your feet and move to Florida if you like the system better. That’s what I believe in,” he said. “That’s a different government than Lindsey Graham. He doesn’t even have the same philosophy, from what I see.”
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