July 14, 2026 • 7 mins
Ryan talks with Politics Editor at The Dispatch Mike Warren about his article, Lindsey Graham’s Tenacious Pursuit of Influence. They discuss how Lindsey Graham positioned himself at the center of major political debates and the issues he believed mattered most.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
So Ryan Gorman Show podcast presented by Farah and Farah,
Accident Attorney's Tama.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
And let's bring in politics editor for The Dispatch, Mike Warren.
You can find all of us work in a whole
lot more at The Dispatch dot com and you can
check him out on x as well at Michael R. Warren. So, Mike,
you wrote this new piece for The Dispatch, Lindsey Graham's
Tenacious Pursuit of Influence, And I thought it was a
(00:27):
really interesting piece, and I think Lindsay Graham's a very
interesting political figure. Give us an overview of what you
were laying out.
Speaker 3 (00:39):
Well, I agree with you, Ryan, Lindsey Graham was an
interesting and sort of consequential figure in American politics. He
really straddles kind of two periods and Republican politics for
George W. Bush period, Brush became a few years before
Bush became president, and of course the Trump period and
(01:00):
what you see and certainly what I saw across that
more than thirty years in all this that the Lindsey
Graham served is a real ability and interest in being
in the middle of all the debates on the issues
that he found most important. Most of those were on
foreign policy and national security, but not all of them.
(01:22):
You know, he was involved going all the way back
to the impeachment of Bill Clinton back in the late
nineteen nineties, all the way through the social security debate
of the second second term of George W. Bush's administration,
and all the way through just this past year in
the budget debates as well as chairman of the Senate
(01:43):
Budget Committee. So Lindsey Graham has just sort of straddles
not only those periods in Republican politics and American politics,
but he sort of straddles all these areas as well
of policy and politics. He really was a more sequential
figure that I think people necessarily thought, you know, in
(02:04):
the in the days, weeks and even years before he died.
Speaker 2 (02:07):
So the question I have here Lindsey Graham, There's no
doubt he had some very closely held principles, especially on
foreign policy for example, but sometimes he would go where
the political winds blew, and we've especially seen that more
(02:30):
recently with how he buddied up to President Trump. Is
that Lindsey Graham abandoning political abandoning principles for political opportunity,
or is that Lindsey Graham using his principles and wanting
(02:55):
to influence politics based on his principles. So that's why
he did what he did.
Speaker 3 (03:05):
Right, And I think you have hit on the big
question about Lindsey Graham's ultimate legacy or certainly history of
judgment on that legacy. That's the question. Right, they did
do this, I mean if you asked him while he
was still alive, and there are a number of the
porters who did, and he talked about this pretty openly.
He wanted to be in the conversation influencing Donald Trump
(03:27):
on the things that are most important to him. And
among those things were of course support for Israel from
the United States, you know, going after the Iranian regime
and trying to dismantle it and even to depose it,
certainly to dismantle its nuclear program. The defense of Ukraine
against Russian incursion. These were all things in the last
(03:48):
several years of his life and his career that he
cared a lot about. He said, you know, I've got
to be in that room, and Donald Trump is the president,
and he's the president and the leader of our party up.
On the other hand, you could see a lot of
guide to the argument that what he ultimately did was
compromise his own principles. You know, he was very much
(04:10):
a free trader until Donald Trump came along and suddenly
Lindsey Graham became a big defender of trade protectionism. So,
you know, it's a question of what does it mean
to have principles in a time when those principles are
not in favor in your party. People like myself, who
are in journalism, you know, draw that line maybe differently
(04:32):
than someone in elective politics. I think it's going to
be something that people are grappling with now in the
wake of his death and thinking about long term, not
just for Lindsey Graham, but for a lot of people
who made different decisions within the Republican Party over the
last decade. Lindsey Graham never written away, I think from
the decisions that he made to abandon his criticism of
(04:55):
Donald Trump, you know, ten eleven years ago, and embrace
him as maybe a lesser of two evils in his mind.
Speaker 2 (05:04):
We're joined by politics editor for The Dispatch, Mike Warren.
You can find his piece Lindsey Graham's tenacious pursuit of
influence at the Dispatch dot com. How much influence did
he really have? Whether it was you know, his time
spent with John McCain, especially when John McCain was at
the height of his influence, or with President Trump.
Speaker 3 (05:29):
It's a good question, and I don't know if we
have a definitive answer to that. As well, Ryan, you
can see a number of places where he was influential.
There were successes. If you look back to two thousand
and seven, what the policy that ultimately became the surge
in Iraq that really changed things and turned things around.
Things were going very badly in two thousand and five
(05:50):
and two thousand and six in Iraq. It was Lindsey Graham,
along with John McCain and Joe Lieberman, the three migos,
who pushed not only on the Bush administration but also
on members with his own party within the Senate to
actually redouble America's efforts in Iraq and try to gain
back some of the ground that have been lost. That
was the success. What about the Iran War? I think
(06:13):
there's a lot of reason to think that Donald Trump
and the United States would not be involved in Iran
if not for Lindsey Graham's influence. On the other hand,
Iran has not gone as anybody who supported that effort
or just supported the effort to change things in Iran,
change the calculus. It has not gone the way those
people have wanted. I don't think certainly is not gone
(06:34):
the way Lindsay Graham would have wanted it to go.
And so I think that legacy of the success of
his influence on policies certainly was influential. Whether he was
successful on those things that he was influential with, I
think that's a little bit more muddled, And if I
had to put my thumb on the scale one way
or the other, I would say that in many ways
(06:56):
success was just out of reach for Lindsey Graham from
much of his career.
Speaker 2 (07:01):
It's a piece on Lindsay Graham definitely worth reading, Lindsey
Graham's Tenacious Pursuit of Influence. You can find it and
a whole lot more at The Dispatch dot com and
you can also check out Mike Warren at Michael R.
Warren on X. Mike really appreciate the time and insight
this morning. Thanks so much for coming back on.
Speaker 1 (07:19):
Thanks Ryan us in live to have a Ryan Gorman
Show on iHeartRadio every weekday morning on WIOD in Miami,
w FLA and Tampa. Presented by Farah and Farah Accident Attorneys, Tampa,
So Ryan Gorman Show podcast presented by Farah and Farah,
Accident Attorney's Tama.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
And let's bring in politics editor for The Dispatch, Mike Warren.
You can find all of us work in a whole
lot more at The Dispatch dot com and you can
check him out on x as well at Michael R. Warren. So, Mike,
you wrote this new piece for The Dispatch, Lindsey Graham's
Tenacious Pursuit of Influence, And I thought it was a
(00:27):
really interesting piece, and I think Lindsay Graham's a very
interesting political figure. Give us an overview of what you
were laying out.
Speaker 3 (00:39):
Well, I agree with you, Ryan, Lindsey Graham was an
interesting and sort of consequential figure in American politics. He
really straddles kind of two periods and Republican politics for
George W. Bush period, Brush became a few years before
Bush became president, and of course the Trump period and
(01:00):
what you see and certainly what I saw across that
more than thirty years in all this that the Lindsey
Graham served is a real ability and interest in being
in the middle of all the debates on the issues
that he found most important. Most of those were on
foreign policy and national security, but not all of them.
(01:22):
You know, he was involved going all the way back
to the impeachment of Bill Clinton back in the late
nineteen nineties, all the way through the social security debate
of the second second term of George W. Bush's administration,
and all the way through just this past year in
the budget debates as well as chairman of the Senate
(01:43):
Budget Committee. So Lindsey Graham has just sort of straddles
not only those periods in Republican politics and American politics,
but he sort of straddles all these areas as well
of policy and politics. He really was a more sequential
figure that I think people necessarily thought, you know, in
(02:04):
the in the days, weeks and even years before he died.
Speaker 2 (02:07):
So the question I have here Lindsey Graham, There's no
doubt he had some very closely held principles, especially on
foreign policy for example, but sometimes he would go where
the political winds blew, and we've especially seen that more
(02:30):
recently with how he buddied up to President Trump. Is
that Lindsey Graham abandoning political abandoning principles for political opportunity,
or is that Lindsey Graham using his principles and wanting
(02:55):
to influence politics based on his principles. So that's why
he did what he did.
Speaker 3 (03:05):
Right, And I think you have hit on the big
question about Lindsey Graham's ultimate legacy or certainly history of
judgment on that legacy. That's the question. Right, they did
do this, I mean if you asked him while he
was still alive, and there are a number of the
porters who did, and he talked about this pretty openly.
He wanted to be in the conversation influencing Donald Trump
(03:27):
on the things that are most important to him. And
among those things were of course support for Israel from
the United States, you know, going after the Iranian regime
and trying to dismantle it and even to depose it,
certainly to dismantle its nuclear program. The defense of Ukraine
against Russian incursion. These were all things in the last
(03:48):
several years of his life and his career that he
cared a lot about. He said, you know, I've got
to be in that room, and Donald Trump is the president,
and he's the president and the leader of our party up.
On the other hand, you could see a lot of
guide to the argument that what he ultimately did was
compromise his own principles. You know, he was very much
(04:10):
a free trader until Donald Trump came along and suddenly
Lindsey Graham became a big defender of trade protectionism. So,
you know, it's a question of what does it mean
to have principles in a time when those principles are
not in favor in your party. People like myself, who
are in journalism, you know, draw that line maybe differently
(04:32):
than someone in elective politics. I think it's going to
be something that people are grappling with now in the
wake of his death and thinking about long term, not
just for Lindsey Graham, but for a lot of people
who made different decisions within the Republican Party over the
last decade. Lindsey Graham never written away, I think from
the decisions that he made to abandon his criticism of
(04:55):
Donald Trump, you know, ten eleven years ago, and embrace
him as maybe a lesser of two evils in his mind.
Speaker 2 (05:04):
We're joined by politics editor for The Dispatch, Mike Warren.
You can find his piece Lindsey Graham's tenacious pursuit of
influence at the Dispatch dot com. How much influence did
he really have? Whether it was you know, his time
spent with John McCain, especially when John McCain was at
the height of his influence, or with President Trump.
Speaker 3 (05:29):
It's a good question, and I don't know if we
have a definitive answer to that. As well, Ryan, you
can see a number of places where he was influential.
There were successes. If you look back to two thousand
and seven, what the policy that ultimately became the surge
in Iraq that really changed things and turned things around.
Things were going very badly in two thousand and five
(05:50):
and two thousand and six in Iraq. It was Lindsey Graham,
along with John McCain and Joe Lieberman, the three migos,
who pushed not only on the Bush administration but also
on members with his own party within the Senate to
actually redouble America's efforts in Iraq and try to gain
back some of the ground that have been lost. That
was the success. What about the Iran War? I think
(06:13):
there's a lot of reason to think that Donald Trump
and the United States would not be involved in Iran
if not for Lindsey Graham's influence. On the other hand,
Iran has not gone as anybody who supported that effort
or just supported the effort to change things in Iran,
change the calculus. It has not gone the way those
people have wanted. I don't think certainly is not gone
(06:34):
the way Lindsay Graham would have wanted it to go.
And so I think that legacy of the success of
his influence on policies certainly was influential. Whether he was
successful on those things that he was influential with, I
think that's a little bit more muddled, And if I
had to put my thumb on the scale one way
or the other, I would say that in many ways
(06:56):
success was just out of reach for Lindsey Graham from
much of his career.
Speaker 2 (07:01):
It's a piece on Lindsay Graham definitely worth reading, Lindsey
Graham's Tenacious Pursuit of Influence. You can find it and
a whole lot more at The Dispatch dot com and
you can also check out Mike Warren at Michael R.
Warren on X. Mike really appreciate the time and insight
this morning. Thanks so much for coming back on.
Speaker 1 (07:19):
Thanks Ryan us in live to have a Ryan Gorman
Show on iHeartRadio every weekday morning on WIOD in Miami,
w FLA and Tampa. Presented by Farah and Farah Accident Attorneys, Tampa,
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