Graham drops out of 2016 presidential race

Lindsey Graham, the hawkish Republican senator who has called for thousands of USA troops in the Middle East and warned Americans against nominating Donald Trump for president, announced Monday, December 21, he is exiting the White House race.

“I have offered a detailed plan to win a war we can not afford to lose and to turn back the tide of isolationism that has been rising in the Republican Party”, said Graham, whose campaign for the presidency lasted 204 days.

In an interview with CNN, Graham warned that the election is “for the heart and soul of the Republican Party”.

Lindsey Graham announced today he was ending his 2016 presidential campaign.

Graham, who retired this year from the Air Force Reserve, made the fight against Islamic terrorism the center of his campaign. “We’re going to have to start consolidating as Republicans”. But he was left out of the most recent debate because his poll numbers had dropped below the threshold. Even in his home state, Graham was close to becoming a non-entity who could have come away from primary day with an embarrassingly bad showing that would endanger his political future should he decide to run for re-election in 2018. Ultimately, though, it wasn’t Graham but the terrorist attacks in Paris and the mass shooting in San Bernardino, California, that reshaped the GOP race into one dominated by national security fears. He barely cracked 1 percent in most surveys of primary state voters. “I can not tell you how frustrating it has been to have spent all this time and effort preparing myself to be Commander-in-Chief and to be put at the “kiddie table”. “That’s what Lindsey has had on the sidelines: big check writers”.

And you can’t stress too much how bad Graham’s foreign policy positions were, and continue to be.

He noted that former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and Sen. Wilkins couldn’t immediately be reached following Graham’s announcement Monday morning. “I have no intention of endorsing anyone right now”, he said. Graham, too, could make an endorsement, though he’s given no indication of when that might be.

Obama acknowledged that his administration has not done enough to communicate with the public about its approach to defeating Islamic State, but seemed to pin some blame on a media “pursuing ratings” by portraying the militant group as a more direct threat to the USA than it is. The move leaves 13 candidates remaining in the race for the Republican nod.