When Attorney General Jeff Sessions resigned earlier this month, Lindsey Graham said he didn’t want a job in the Trump administration.
At least not that job.
But with speculation swirling about President Donald Trump potentially choosing a new running mate as his vice president for the 2020 campaign, Graham’s close relationship with Trump is getting renewed attention.
An article in Roll Call speculates “The Trump Whisperer,” as the newspaper labels Graham, could replace current Vice President Mike Pence when Trump runs for re-election.
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“Graham seems to have some special way of handling Trump,” an anonymous GOP strategist told Roll Call. “Some say he has abdicated all of his principles to support the president, but I don’t think that’s true. I think he’s playing a longer game.”
The two Republicans clashed often when Graham ran against Trump for the GOP presidential nomination in 2016. But since then, Graham has become a close adviser to the president, backing some of the president’s more controversial moves.
Graham’s advocacy helped push Supreme Court Associate Justice Brett Kavanaugh over the finish line in Senate confirmation hearings last month. This month, Graham was touted as a potential replacement for attorney general when Sessions resigned, a post Graham declined any interest in.
Graham isn’t alone in the speculation if Trump dumps Pence for 2020.
Sources have told the New York Times that U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley, the former S.C. governor, has been considered for the job, amid hopes of increasing the GOP ticket’s appeal to women voters.
Haley announced last month she would leave the U.N. at the end of the year, and the Lexington Republican — not Graham — leads Roll Call’s list of possible Pence replacements.
The speculation comes as Trump has become concerned about his relationship with Pence, the Times says. The president has been asking aides if they think the vice president still is loyal to him.
The president reportedly still is upset that, during the 2016 campaign, Pence put out a disapproving statement about Trump’s comments on an “Access Hollywood” tape in which the future president bragged about grabbing women’s genitals.
Trump has called the speculation a “phony story,” saying of Pence in a tweet that he “can’t imagine any President having a better or closer relationship with their Vice President.”
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