WSAV EXCLUSIVE: U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham speaks on golf, Trump, DOGE, tariffs
HILTON HEAD ISLAND, S.C. (WSAV) — WSAV spoke to South Carolinian U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham Wednesday at the RBC Heritage.
WSAV Sports Director Joey Lamar asked Graham about President Donald Trump's first 100 days in office, the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) and tariffs.
Listen to the interview or read the transcript below.
Joey Lamar: Joined here by U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham from the great state of South Carolina first. First, we'll get you all the golf question. How was it today? How was it playing with Collin Morikawa?
Lindsey Graham: He is awesome. So, in the ninth hole, I bet him closest to the pin and somehow won 20 bucks. And I'm not going to tell the IRS, but he's such a nice man, you know, I'm sure he'll do well.
JL: All right. Let's get to a little bit more of a serious question. Donald Trump is entering the end of his hundred days. How would you say he's done in his second term in the first hundred days?
LG: On the border? A plus. You know, we shut down the border. They said it couldn't be done. He did it. We're set for the tax cuts. But let me just tell you and everybody else listening, if we don't deliver on making the tax cuts permanent, we have nobody to blame but ourselves as Republicans. And I think President Trump will get us over the line. I'm hoping and praying for peace between Ukraine and Russia, an honorable peace. And I worry a lot about where Iran is headed with their nuclear program. So, pray, first of all, this is a dangerous time for the world. So, we'll just keep pushing.
JL: Is there anything in the first hundred days that you saw that you think may have could have been better?
LG: Well, let's see how the tariffs come out. I think the tariffs are great deal opportunities. I want to make sure that we don't overshoot the runway here. But getting better deals is, I think, possible mow. Whatever you charge us, we're going to charge you, makes sense to me. If you're doing bad things like fentanyl, come into the country, Mexico, we're going to hit you with tariffs, you know, economy wide tariffs. We'll see how that plays out, but all in all, I think President Trump is trying to keep his promises. And one of the promises we made to you is that we're going to cut your taxes and secure your border, and we've got to deliver it.
JL: Democrats have criticized Donald Trump about having Elon Musk in the White House and some of the things he's done. How would you rate doge so far as far as cleaning up the government and some of what they call inefficiency in government?
LG: You know, we've been talking everybody runs for president says they want to really clean up the budget. What Elon has done with his team is actually do it. This is the first time since I've been up there that somebody is kind of a technological genius, is looking deep into the government and the things they found are pretty astonishing. So, what we'll do is take some of the savings, the wasteful spending, and put it in a package called rescission, and we'll let our Democratic friends vote yes or no. They're criticizing Elon Musk. The question for me is, will they vote to cut the waste that he found? I think some of them will.
JL: Is that rescission going to include like a check back to the taxpayers?
LG: I don't think so. I don't I don't think will flow it back to the taxpayers as much as try to start bending the debt curve. You know, I'm trying to get, I'm the budget chairman, and my goal is to make the tax cuts permanent. That will create more revenue but save about a $1.5 to 2 trillion out of the current budget. And that will get us on a glide path where we have more revenue and less spending. And my goal is to try and get the budget balanced before President Trump leaves.
JL: This is the last one. Now, some of that spending inefficiency has been to government employees and they have laid off some of them. Do you kind of feel bad about that? You know, people losing their jobs?
LG: I don't ever wish anybody to lose their job, but we're running, the government is overextended. We're spending too much. The VA is you know, we love the VA, but the VA has grown by like 50% in four or five years. It's time to look at every job in the government and see, is that really necessary? But I don't wish anybody lose their job. But to the American taxpayer, I think you need a more efficient government, and we're trying to deliver that for you.
JL: All right. Senator Lindsey Graham, thank you so much for doing this.
LG: I have one thing, to the people in the community who put this tournament on, to all the volunteers from South Carolina and Georgia, you make us proud. I've been coming here a lot, but this place is poppin'.
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