MAGA podcaster Megyn Kelly was “mortified” by Darline Graham’s embarrassing debate fail on Tuesday night.
On her podcast on Wednesday, Kelly, 55, commented on a clip of Graham, the sister of the late South Carolina senator Lindsey Graham, being booed during a debate in her hometown of Newberry.
Graham, who was appointed to her late brother’s Senate seat at President Donald Trump’s request, was asked by co-moderator Greta Van Susteren about the national security implications of Taiwan and the South China Sea.
“I’m just going to be honest here... I’m not that informed on national security,” Graham, 62, replied, prompting a score of jeers from the crowd. “But I do support the military.”
“I’m not a polished politician up here. National security is not my thing, not my area of expertise, but I support the military,” she added.
Kelly was not pleased with the senator’s candid admission.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I know she’s just pinch-hitting, but that’s disqualifying, is it not?”
Kelly’s guests—Tom Bevan, Carl Cannon, and Andrew Walworth of RealClearPolitics—concurred.
“She didn’t get anything through osmosis from her brother about foreign policy, apparently,” Bevan said. “I mean, that’s all he talked about!”
“Not even through osmosis, not even through sitting in the Senate for the past couple of months,” Kelly agreed. “I’m mortified by that answer. It’s not really, exactly her fault, although she did accept the appointment.”
“But has no one looked into whether she knows anything about politics, world events, international events?” she continued. “This actually is an important thing to understand as a U.S. Senator.
Walworth said her statement may have cemented her loss in the Senate primary runoff against Rep. Ralph Norman.
“Ralph Norman actually answered the question, and he answered it pretty well,” he said, though he noted it wasn’t a “knock it out of the park” answer.
Norman called Taiwan a “definite ally,” saying that Trump is “enabling Taiwan to defend themselves against China.”
“But it’s peace through strength he’s showing with Iran, that China, Russia, and others are looking at it so they don’t want to deal with America,” the congressman said. “And that’s why they haven’t attacked Taiwan.”
Kelly suggested that Norman missed an opportunity to attack his opponent.
“She’s a sympathetic figure, but he should have said, ‘With respect... I understand Darline is grieving her brother, but she has no business being a U.S. senator and not able to answer that question,’” she said. “Guys are always too afraid to hit women, you know. Not physically—rhetorically, in a political debate.”
Kelly and all three of her guests agreed that Graham “has no business” running for her brother’s open Senate seat.
“Look—I understand she was his sister and all that, but if I were a U.S. senator, and God forbid something were to happen to me, you can’t go get Strudwick, my lab, and make him a U.S. senator,” she said. “You actually need some basic qualifications.”
