WASHINGTON (AP) — The Senate Ethics Committee admonishes South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham for soliciting campaign contributions at a federal building following a November 2022 Fox News interview in which he asked viewers to donate to a GOP candidate.
Graham violated Senate rules and standards of conduct because he was in a Senate office building when he did the interview, the leaders of the ethics panel said in a rare public letter released Thursday.
“The public must be confident that members will use public funds only for official actions in the interest of the United States, not for partisan political activity,” wrote Senate Ethics Committee Chair Chris Coons, D-Del., and Senator James Lankford of Oklahoma. , the Republican vice chairman of the panel. “Your actions fell short of that standard, resulting in damage to public trust in the United States Senate. You are hereby admonished.”
Coons and Lankford wrote that during the November 30, 2022 interview on Fox News on November 30, 2022, Graham asked for campaign contributions to the campaign committee of Georgia State Senate candidate Herschel Walker.
In a statement Thursday, Graham said: “It was a mistake. I take responsibility. I will try to do better in the future.”
It is unclear whether Graham could face criminal penalties for his actions. Coons and Lankford said this was the senator’s second offense after he similarly solicited campaign contributions for his own campaign during an unscheduled 2020 hallway interview.
The ethics committee rejected that complaint and notified Graham in a private letter, Coons and Lankford wrote. The panel did not publicly disclose that violation until now, having determined at the time that his conduct was “unintentional, technical or otherwise of a de minimis nature,” the letter said.
The ban on campaign recruiting in federal buildings and the use of federal funds for campaign activities “have been consistent and clear throughout your years of Senate service,” they wrote, and Graham asked for campaign contributions in the November interview “despite the specific guidance of the commission after your violation in October 2020.”
A spokesman for Graham did not immediately comment on the admonition.
