US Sen. Lindsey Graham, a longtime Republican from South Carolina and ally of President Donald Trump, has died at the age of 71 after a brief and sudden illness. Graham served in the US Senate for over two decades, making a name for himself as a foreign policy hawk who advocated for military intervention in Iran and Iraq and was a leading voice for unwavering US support for Israel and Ukraine.

Early Life and Career

Graham began his political career in the early 1990s after serving as a city and county attorney in South Carolina. He served in the US Air Force as a prosecutor and defense attorney for six years prior to that. Graham’s early life was marked by the deaths of his mother and father within 15 months of each other when he was an undergraduate. He helped raise his then 13-year-old sister, Darline, and later adopted her.

Graham briefly ran for the Republican nomination for president in 2015. During the 2016 GOP primary, Graham was one of Trump’s fiercest Republican objectors, calling him the ‘most flawed nominee in the history of the Republican Party.’ However, after a March 2017 meeting with the newly inaugurated Trump, Graham became a vocal ally and one of Trump’s most trusted voices in the Senate.

Foreign Policy and Legacy

Graham was a staunch supporter of arming Ukraine and applying sanctions against Russia. He was also a leading voice for US support for Israel, making multiple trips to the region and championing billions in security aid. Graham was one of the Senate’s most persistent advocates for continued US military aid to Ukraine, making repeated trips to Kyiv throughout the war.

President Volodymyr Zelensky said he was ‘deeply saddened’ by the news of Graham’s passing, calling him a ‘true defender of freedom and the values that make our world safer.’ Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that Israel had lost ‘one of its greatest friends’ in Graham.

Original reporting: KRDO (Colorado Springs metro) — read the source article.