Climate Changers: U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham
First in a series profiling key players in environmental politics. Who he is: U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican Green cred: Until recently the answer would have been: not much. Graham received a 9 percent rating from the League of Conservation Voters and a 100 percent from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, one of the nation’s largest business groups (and an ardent foe of cap-and-trade legislation). But last year he stood with Sen. John Kerry, the Massachusetts Democrat and former presidential candidate, and said the country needed to curb global warming. The two penned an op-ed for The New York Times together, saying, "We refuse to accept the argument that the United States cannot lead the world in addressing global climate change." The alliance forged by Kerry, Graham and independent Connecticut Sen. Joseph Lieberman signaled a seismic shift in climate change negotiations, ensuring that whatever bill resulted from their combined efforts would have bipartisan support (even if it’s only Graham’s one vote), a rare feature in today’s hyper-partisan environment in which some Republicans still call climate change a hoax. Even after Sunday’s rancorous passage of health care legislation — which led some Republicans to vow further obstruction of the Obama agenda — Graham warned of partisan gridlock but said he wouldn’t abandon his collaboration with the other senators on climate. Where he comes from: Graham is the son of tavern owners from the small town of Central, S.C. By the time he was in college, both of his parents had died of illness. He adopted and raised his 13-year-old sister. He attended law school and joined the Air Force as a lawyer. How he got elected: He won a seat in the House of Representatives in 1994 — the year of Newt Gingrich’s "Republican Revolution" — by campaigning against President Bill Clinton, declaring, "I’m one less vote for an agenda that makes you want to throw up. Why he cares about climate change: In an interview with The New York Times , Graham said young people accept climate change as a fact and expect politicians to do something about it. Dismissing the concerns of the next generation would bode ill for Republicans later, he says. He calls our growing reliance on foreign oil "political malpractice" for which every member of Congress is responsible. He says Republicans and, more widely, the country need a strategy to deal with greenhouse gas emissions. "We can’t be a nation that always tries and fails," Graham says. "We have to eventually get some hard problem right." Why he doesn’t like to talk about "climate change:" Graham downplays the word "climate change," a term that has become politicized in many circles. Instead he talks about "cleaning up the air" and fighting "carbon pollution." Why this isn’t the first time he’s shown an independent streak: He bucked conservatives and voted to confirm Justice Sonia Sotomayor, calling her "one of the most qualified nominees to be selected for the Supreme Court in decades." During the Bush years, he defied the GOP party line and said Republicans were using the Iraq war as an excuse to run up deficits and be fiscally irresponsible. More recently, he drew on his background as a military prosecutor to voice support for Obama’s proposal to close the Guantanamo Bay detention center. Still, that doesn’t mean he’s exactly cozy with the current White House occupant. He called the Obama administration’s 2010 budget proposal a "road map to disaster that will bankrupt this country." And despite his willingness to work across the aisle on climate legislation, he’s a typical conservative in many ways: pro-industry, pro-gun rights, anti-gay marriage. He voted against a ban on oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. He backs GOP positions more than 90 percent of the time, according to analysis by Congressional Quarterly. Weird coincidence: Graham was born in the same hospital in South Carolina as former U.S. Sen. (and now-disgraced presidential candidate) John Edwards. Graham is two years younger.