Donald Trump has said the FBI is “wasting their time” investigating Lindsey Graham’s death after Kash Patel helped fuel wild conspiracy theories.
While speaking to reporters in the Oval Office on Tuesday, the 80-year-old president was asked whether he knew why the FBI was getting involved in the late South Carolina senator’s death, even though it was due to natural causes linked to a cardiovascular condition.
Days after Graham’s death, Patel posted that the FBI is “assisting local authorities and has made every necessary resource available,” without explaining how or why. Conspiracy theories have also raged online that Russia may have poisoned the 71-year-old, who had met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Kyiv the day before he died.
On Monday, FBI agents were spotted at Graham’s home in Washington, D.C., taking photos. No items were removed from Graham’s home.
Trump downplayed any suggestion that there was anything suspicious surrounding Graham’s death and reiterated that a medical examiner ruled it was caused by a tear in one of his main arteries—known as an aortic dissection—which is extremely difficult to detect.
“If it happens, there’s not much you can do about it. Sounds unfortunate, but there’s not much you can do about it,” Trump said. “His father died of the same thing at about the same age.
“So I don’t see a lot of evil there. I know there’s all sorts of conspiracy theories going along, [but] I think the FBI is wasting their time if they’re doing that.”
Patel, a former MAGA podcaster with no prior experience in law enforcement, has frequently been accused of being more obsessed with social media clout than doing actual FBI work.
Patel announced that the FBI was getting involved in Graham’s death in an X post in which he praised the Republican as “a devoted public servant, a fierce defender of our nation, and a true patriot who dedicated his life to the people of South Carolina and the United States.”
A number of MAGA figures spread unsubstantiated claims that Graham, who had been calling for sanctions on Russian President Vladimir Putin and Moscow, could have been poisoned by the Kremlin.
Others pushed similar claims that Iran could have been involved in Graham’s death, given that he was one of the biggest supporters of Trump’s war against the Middle Eastern country.
A full autopsy report on Graham has not been released, pending the results of a toxicology report and other tests.
The Daily Beast has contacted the FBI for comment.
