Lindsey Graham: GOP Isn’t Just ‘the Party of Short White Guys’

Despite his apparent disagreement with her on a range of issues, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) is emerging as one of Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor’s biggest supporters.

Perhaps because it’s clear she’ll be confirmed and he wants to convince Americans there’s a “softer,” more inclusive side to the Republican party, Graham just tried to convince GOP witness Linda Chavez, chair of the conservative Center for Equal Opportunity, that Sotomayor really isn’t all that bad.

“When I look at her I see some things that bug the hell out of me, but I also see some things that really impresses me,” he said, after Chavez testified against Sotomayor’s confirmation.

Noting that like Justices Samuel Alito and John Roberts, Sotomayor had received a “well qualified” rating from the bench, Graham asked Chavez “Does that impress you at all … ?” (It didn’t.)

After suggesting that Republicans sometimes make political apppointments based partly on race, too, he said: “Politics is politics. I know that Republicans sit down and think, we’ve got some power, let’s let the whole country know the Republican party is not just a party of short white guys … We try to show that we’re a party that looks at all Americans and wants to give them an opportunity.”

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