Just five weeks into Donald Trump’s presidency, Republican Sens. John McCain and Lindsey Graham have already proven to be major headaches for the new President.
While many of their Republican colleagues in Congress have worked to make inroads with the new administration, hoping to capitalize on GOP control over two branches of government, the two senators have repeatedly broken with the White House. McCain has accused Trump of running an “administration in disarray.” Graham called his budget proposal “dead on arrival” on Capitol Hill.
Now, the two are making their case to a national audience in a Wednesday town hall hosted by CNN and moderated by chief political correspondent Dana Bash.
The town hall comes just one day after Trump delivered his first primetime speech to a joint session of Congress.
And two issues — immigration and defense spending — could provide Graham, a South Carolina Republican, and McCain, an Arizona Republican, new fodder.
Graham could have reason to praise Trump. He has long called for comprehensive immigration reform, including a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants — particularly “Dreamers” who were brought into the country illegally as children.
Trump’s call Tuesday night for both sides to compromise on immigration could create a political avenue for such reforms.
McCain, however, has been displeased by Trump’s calls for increases in defense spending that don’t match the Arizona Republican senator’s targets.
He continued to express concerns about the President’s defense budget proposal Tuesday, saying there’s “not nearly enough” money for programs.
“And it simply won’t take care of the issues and challenges that we have,” McCain said. “For example, half the F-18 (Super Hornets) are now grounded for lack of parts and we have increased operations in both Syria and Afghanistan. There’s a need for $640 billion, just as we laid out in our white paper.”
McCain and Graham are both unsuccessful former presidential candidates. McCain ran in 2000 and was the GOP nominee in 2008, while Graham was a member of the crowded Republican primary field in 2016 from which Trump emerged. The two are among the Senate’s foremost national security hawks, and are typically in lockstep on foreign policy issues — urging a larger US role in combating terror threats such as ISIS in Iraq and Syria and a tougher approach to Russia.
During the campaign, Trump feuded with both McCain, whose war-hero status he questioned, and Graham, whose personal cell phone number he read aloud while on national television.
And both have frequently criticized Trump during his five weeks in office.
In Munich on February, McCain fretted about “the growing inability, and even unwillingness, to separate truth from lies” — a clear shot at Trump, who has espoused falsehoods about crowd size, voter fraud and more.
Graham, meanwhile, declared Trump’s budget “dead on arrival” Tuesday, pointing to its cuts to the State Department and complaining that Trump didn’t call for more significant increases in defense spending.
This story is being updated to reflect the news of the event.