By Evaristo Lara
Thanks to the support he received from President Donald Trump, Senator Lindsey Graham achieved a victory in the South Carolina Republican primary and thus ensures his candidacy for a fifth term.
The 70-year-old conservative defeated his party partner Designate Lynch and thus avoided competing in a second round.
On the eve of the elections, Trump defined businessman Lynch as a “disaster for the Republican Party” and perhaps that ended up causing damage to his candidacy.
In addition to the presidential endorsement, data from AdImpact, the leading advertising intelligence and analysis platform in the United States, reveals that Graham’s campaign team acquired more than $13 million in ads during the race.
According to the Connected Press (AP) news agency, when the results of the race were announced around 9 pm, Graham already had more than 58% of the votes, which accredited him as the winner of the elections.
In this way, she maintained her undefeated streak and now her next litmus test is to face Democrat Annie Andrews in November.
It is noteworthy that The South Carolina lawyer was first elected to the Senate in 2002 and has never needed a runoff to win on the ballot since.
As if this were not enough, it is the third time that Trump’s ally has managed to prevail over a vast group of Republican candidates.
His first victory came in 2014, when in a race against seven other candidates he obtained 56% of the votes.
Six years later, Graham repeated the formula and although his percentage of support at the polls was around 68%, there were only three opponents who dared to challenge him.
For Donald Trump, Lindsey Graham’s victory at the polls was of utmost importance, since the South Carolina elections historically tend to be a kind of thermometer that measures the president’s influence within the Republican Party.
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