{"id":12357,"date":"2026-07-21T07:41:24","date_gmt":"2026-07-21T02:41:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=12357"},"modified":"2026-07-21T07:41:24","modified_gmt":"2026-07-21T02:41:24","slug":"thune-withholds-a-south-carolina-senate-endorsement-while-complimenting-graham","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=12357","title":{"rendered":"Thune withholds a South Carolina Senate endorsement while complimenting Graham"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script>\r\n  atOptions = {\r\n    'key' : '644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6',\r\n    'format' : 'iframe',\r\n    'height' : 90,\r\n    'width' : 728,\r\n    'params' : {}\r\n  };\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script src=\"https:\/\/www.highperformanceformat.com\/644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<br \/>\n<br \/><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/static.politico.com\/52\/d2\/708286f743688668f14c9e1ebc6d\/u-s-congress-91148.jpg\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Senate Majority Leader John Thune said Monday he is not endorsing a candidate in the South Carolina race to succeed the late Sen. Lindsey Graham, but believes his sister, Sen. Darline Graham, would be a \u201cstrong candidate.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cShe obviously carries on Lindsey\u2019s legacy. But I think she&#8217;s a very accomplished person in her own right,\u201d Thune said.<\/p>\n<p>Thune added he\u2019ll \u201clet the voters in South Carolina decide.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Thune\u2019s comments come after Darline Graham announced during a Fox News interview Monday she is jumping into the race following President Donald Trump&#8217;s encouraging her to do so during a closed-door meeting last week. Trump posted on Truth Social on Friday that Graham would have his endorsement if she decided to run.<\/p>\n<p>But Trump\u2019s backing of Graham hasn\u2019t stopped others from jumping in the race, including two other Republicans in South Carolina\u2019s congressional delegation. Rep. Ralph Norman (R-S.C.) said over the weekend <a href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.com\/news\/2026\/07\/18\/ralph-norman-south-carolina-senate-01004233\" target=\"_blank\">he will run<\/a>, and Rep. Russell Fry (R-S.C.) <a href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.com\/news\/2026\/07\/20\/fry-jumps-into-south-carolina-senate-race-01004805\" target=\"_blank\">announced his run<\/a> on Monday.<\/p>\n<script async=\"async\" data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/pl30214220.effectivecpmnetwork.com\/9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<div id=\"container-9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\"><\/div>\r\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Senate Majority Leader John Thune said Monday he is not endorsing a candidate in the South Carolina race to succeed the late Sen. Lindsey Graham, but believes his sister, Sen. Darline Graham, would be a \u201cstrong candidate.\u201d \u201cShe obviously carries on Lindsey\u2019s legacy. But I think she&#8217;s a very accomplished person in her own right,\u201d&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":12358,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/static.politico.com\/52\/d2\/708286f743688668f14c9e1ebc6d\/u-s-congress-91148.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12357","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-political-news"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12357","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12357"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12357\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/12358"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12357"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12357"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12357"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}