Graham: If Biden doesn't handle Afghanistan perfectly, he should be impeached

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) argued on Friday morning that if President Joe Biden “should be impeached” if he isn’t able to evacuate every American and Afghan who helped the United States during the 20-year conflict.

Graham said Friday morning in an interview on “Fox & Friends”:

If we leave any Americans behind, if we leave thousands of those Afghans who fought along our side behind bravely, Joe Biden deserves to be impeached for a higher crime and misdemeanor of dereliction of duty. If we leave one American behind, if we don’t get all those Afghans who stepped up to the plate to help us out, then Joe Biden, in my view, has committed a high crime and misdemeanor under the Constitution and should be impeached.

Graham makes his impeachment threats against Biden even as he was one of the loudest opponents of the two impeachments Former President Donald Trump faced during his time in office.

In October 2019, when Democrats first began the process of impeaching Trump for abuse of power for pushing Ukraine to investigate Biden ahead of the 2020 presidential election, Graham said, “Impeachment over this? What a nothing (non-quid pro quo) burger. Democrats have lost their minds when it comes to President Trump.” Graham said he wouldn’t be an impartial juror in that impeachment trial.

In January, when Democrats started a second impeachment process, this time for Trump inciting violence at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, Graham argued that impeachment is too divisive and shouldn’t happen.

“Any attempt to impeach President Trump would not only be unsuccessful in the Senate but would be a dangerous precedent for the future of the presidency,” Graham tweeted on Jan. 8. “It will take both parties to heal the nation.”

During the impeachment trial in February, Graham said he found the evidence Democratic impeachment managers presented — including that insurrectionists were reading Trump’s tweets during their attack — to be “offensive and absurd.”

While Graham is arguing that the United States should take in Afghan refugees, he has a different take on Central Americans seeking asylum at the border. He introduced a bill in August 2019 that would make it harder for those migrants to both apply for and get asylum.

Graham’s comments come as the United States is attempting to speed up evacuations of Americans and Afghans who aided the U.S. military from the country after the Taliban resumed control this weekend.

Remaining American forces are working through chaos following Biden’s decision to carry out a deal the Trump administration struck with the Taliban to pull U.S. troops from the country after the decades-long conflict.

In recent days, Trump and his former officials have been trying to distance themselves from the deal the administration negotiated with the violent fundamentalist group. Biden said in a speech Monday that the deal left him with the choice of either withdrawing troops as planned or facing another escalation of the conflict that’s cost thousands of lives and trillions of dollars.

Published with permission of The American Independent Foundation.