Republican presidential candidate Lindsey Graham on Wednesday said he’s a “practical kind of guy” who could “connect” with voters who’ve been turned off by the GOP.
“I would talk about things differently than other Republicans, with a record to make it more than talk,” Graham said yesterday. “I think I could go to any group of Hispanics in the country and say: ‘I want to fix immigration and when given the opportunity to destroy your family for my political convenience, I said, ‘No.'”
Graham, a South Carolina senator, was among a bipartisan group of eight senators who came up with an immigration reform compromise that passed the Democratically-led U.S. Senate in 2013, but stalled in the Republican-led House. A business group recently polled Iowa Republicans and found 77 percent support a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants.
Graham made stops in Fort Dodge and Mason City Wednesday. He also spoke to The Des Moines Register’s editorial board. He told reporters and editors for the paper that he’s got a message and “some means” in terms of campaign cash, but he needs to build some “momentum” in Iowa to have a chance.
“I gotta get beyond one percent in Iowa. I’ve just got to work my,” Graham said, pausing, before adjusting to a more family-friendly ending to that sentence, “work my butt off.”
Graham will campaign in Spencer, Orange City, Le Mars and Sioux City today. Republican presidential candidates Mike Huckabee, Bobby Jindal are making stops in Iowa today as well. Democratic presidential candidates Martin O’Malley and Bernie Sanders are arriving here today for holiday-weekend campaigning, too.