‘A personal disappointment,’ Biden says of Sen. Lindsey Graham not recognizing his win

President-elect Joe Biden told Stephen Colbert on Thursday that Sen. Lindsey Graham is a “personal disappointment” after the late night host asked about the state of their famous friendship.

In the interview with Colbert, Biden didn’t say whether their friendship across party lines was salvageable.

“Lindsey’s been a personal disappointment because I was a personal friend of his,” Biden told Colbert.

Graham, a Republican who represents South Carolina in the U.S. Senate, hasn’t recognized Biden’s win and has been accused of suggesting that ballots be tossed out in Georgia, The Washington Post reported.

Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger said he has faced pressure from Republicans to question the validity of ballots in the state in order to overturn President Donald Trump’s loss to Biden. Raffensperger also said Graham appeared to suggest he find a way to toss out ballots, according to the publication.

“It sure looked like he was wanting to go down that road,” Raffensperger, a Republican, said.

Graham denied the accusations, calling them “ridiculous,” NBC News reported.

Graham stopped short of acknowledging Biden’s win after the Electoral College affirmed him as president-elect on Monday, telling reporters: “Yeah, yeah it’s a very, very narrow path for the president. I don’t see how it gets there from here, given what the Supreme Court did. But having said that, I think we’ll let those legal challenges play out,” according to Business Insider.

Graham once called Trump a “race-baiting, xenophobic, religious bigot” on the 2016 campaign trail and tweeted “if we nominate Trump, we will get destroyed.......and we will deserve it.” But he has since become one of Trump’s closest allies, recently saying the president’s four years in office were a “home run.”.

Biden’s friendship with Graham has spanned decades — including when Biden, weeks away from being sworn in as vice president, chose Graham to go with him on a trip to Kabul, The Washington Post reported. They both shared concerns about the war in Afghanistan and Biden said Graham had the “best instincts in the Senate.”

In 2013, a year before Graham was up for reelection, Biden joked that he could spar with his friend in order to get more-conservative Republicans off his back, Roll Call reported.

“I told him I’ll come to South Carolina and campaign for him or against him, whichever will help the most — I know which it’ll be,” Biden said, according to Roll Call.

“I’m going down there to to the JJ next weekend, Lindsey, and I assure you I will rip your skin off for you, and I expect a thank-you note,” Biden added, referring to the South Carolina Democratic Party’s Jefferson-Jackson dinner.

In a video with HuffPost in 2015, Graham spoke about his friendship with Biden after the death of Biden’s son Beau.

“If you can’t admire Joe Biden as a person, then you got a problem,” Graham said. “You need to do some self-evaluation. ‘Cause what’s not to like?”

“He’s the nicest person I think I’ve ever met in politics,” Graham added, appearing to get choked up. “He is as good a man as God ever created and we don’t agree on much, but I think he’s been dealt a really gut blow.”

Their relationship eventually soured when Graham, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, asked the State Department for materials in 2019 pertaining to Biden’s son Hunter’s work for an energy company in Ukraine, The Washington Post reported. Graham said that the move “has nothing to do with friendship,” according to USA Today.

“I am disappointed, and quite frankly I’m angered by the fact that he knows me, he knows my son, he knows there’s nothing to this,” Biden said, according to CNN. “Lindsey is about to go down in a way that I think he’s going to regret his whole life.”

“My friendship with Joe Biden, if he can’t withstand me doing my job, it’s not the friendship I thought we had,” Graham responded in November, USA Today reported.

This story was originally published December 18, 2020 at 8:04 AM with the headline "‘A personal disappointment,’ Biden says of Sen. Lindsey Graham not recognizing his win."