Remembering Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) during a service at the U.S. Capitol on Tuesday, Vice President JD Vance recounted Graham’s love of people, “world-class sense of humor,” and his ability to “disagree with you without being disagreeable.”
Vance spoke after Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) in the Capitol Rotunda before officials, Graham’s family, including his sister, Sen. Darline Graham (R-SC), and the late senator’s staff.
“I want to tell some stories, but I also want to make an observation, which is that Lindsey Graham loved people from all walks of life,” Vance said. “I think in part because of the way that he grew up, because the fact that he wasn’t handed everything, he was fascinated in everybody.”
“He was the kind of guy who would walk into the Senate, and when he walked into the Senate, this was a guy who couldn’t have stood more than five foot six or five foot seven, but he’d swashbuckle in with his jacket open like he was six foot five,” Vance went on to add. “He had an attitude to him, and it’s one of the reasons why Lindsey Graham was Lindsey Graham.”
Vance shared several stories of the late senator, including from their time on the campaign trail in 2022 when Graham made him laugh so hard in between events that Vance developed stomach cramps.
“But what I can say is that I was laughing so hard that by the time we got to the next event, I had abdominal cramps, and I was barely able to speak because Lindsey Graham could make anybody laugh, and he could make anybody feel at home,” Vance said.
In another story, Vance described a strong disagreement he had with the late senator over a funding bill for Ukraine and assumed the argument would lead to a lack of support from Graham for a piece of rail legislation he was working on.
“I remember going back to my staff and saying, ‘Well, that’s probably the end of Lindsey’s vote on the railway bill because he is never going to support anything I support after the argument that he and I just had,’” Vance said.
“And of course, I found out a couple of weeks later from another Senate colleague that the fiercest advocate of that bill behind the scenes was Senator Lindsey Graham,” Vance continued.
Graham told Vance that he supported the legislation because it was important to Vance.
“And so I went to Lindsey, and I said, ‘Why are you helping me? Why are you helping this legislation?’ I expected him to do what so many politicians would do. I expected him to lie and say, ‘Well, I really care about rail legislation,’” Vance recalled.
“And he said, ‘I don’t care about that at all.’ I said, ‘Well, why are you helping me?’ And he said, ‘Well, I don’t care about it, but you do,’” he added.
Vance will remember the senator “as a man who could disagree with you without being disagreeable.”
“I choose to remember Lindsey Graham as a person who could fight with you on one issue, but fight for you on another issue,” he added.
Thune (R-SD) remembered his late colleague as a towering figure in the Senate and on the world stage and pointed to Graham’s advocacy for both Ukraine and the unborn.
“And on the surface, these might seem like two completely separate issues. But it strikes me that, in another way, they are both of a piece,” Thune said. “In both cases, Lindsey Graham saw injustice, and he spoke up; and was as typical of Lindsey, he spoke up fearlessly.”
Like Vance, Thune also highlighted Graham’s humor.
“But lest anyone think it was all work and no levity with Lindsey — let me just say that there was no one, no one who took his job more seriously than Lindsey Graham — but also no one was more capable of cracking up a room,” he said.
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