Lindsey Graham got a war with Iran. What will it cost the country and his party?

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — More than three decades after Lindsey Graham first arrived in Washington, he has everything he could ever want. The senator has President Donald Trump 's ear, a war in Iran and a well-funded path to reelection in his home state of South Carolina.

Now it's just a question of what those things will cost the Republican Party — and the rest of the United States — in this election year when control of Congress hangs in the balance. The conflict is already deeply unpopular with no clear endgame, as oil prices rise and fighting spreads throughout the Middle East.

But Graham, who filed to run for a fifth term on Monday, revealed no doubts while speaking to supporters at his campaign office. Graham said he spoke to Trump on Sunday night and Monday morning as he defended his role in pushing the country toward war.

“We haven’t underestimated Iran at all," he said. "We’re crushing them.”

Graham has been advocating for direct confrontation between Washington and Tehran for more than a decade. He rejected the Iran nuclear deal negotiated under President Barack Obama, cheered on Trump's decision to strike nuclear sites last year and dismissed bipartisan criticism about his bellicose rhetoric.

“If the radical cleric in Iran had a nuclear weapon, he would use it just as certainly as Hitler were to use it. He would kill all the Jews, and we’re next,” Graham said Monday. “I’ll put my efforts to make sure the military has what they need to win the wars we’re in, ahead of anybody in the United States Senate.”

Graham has rarely faced a serious challenge when campaigning for reelection, and there's no sense that this year will be any different. However, what happens with the war could reshape the midterms and Graham's legacy as one of Washington's most outspoken hawks.

“You’re seeing essentially a child on Christmas morning who has gotten everything that he’s ever dreamed of," said Jon Hoffman, a research fellow in defense and foreign policy with the Cato Institute, a libertarian-leaning think tank. "And that’s not best for the country, obviously, but it’s best for Lindsey Graham’s ideology.”

Iran has long been in Graham's crosshairs. As a member of the U.S. House in the 1990s, he backed policies aimed at isolating the country and limiting its missile and nuclear programs.

Graham was elected to the U.S. Senate in 2002, as war with Iraq approached, and he frequently warned that Iran was taking advantage of the conflict to expand its regional influence.

During 2015 remarks at the U.S. Council on Foreign Relations, Graham said he wanted the U.S. military to “stop them and make them pay a price so they’ll never want to do it again.”

“Let’s make sure that their air force, their navy and their army is a shell of its former self,” Graham said. “And let’s be ready to respond when they hit us.”

Graham's aggressive foreign policy originally seemed to be a poor fit for Trump, whose “America First” agenda is skeptical of overseas conflicts, and their relationship has fluctuated over the years. However, they've become golfing buddies who share an affinity for bold military action.

It's a stance that has frustrated some Republicans.

“Lindsey hasn’t seen a fistfight he hasn’t wanted to turn into a bombing raid," complained Rep. Tim Burchett of Tennessee when asked about Graham's interest in expanding its bombing campaign to Lebanon.

As Graham appeared on nearly every cable news show in February to push the case for war, some conservative critics described him as callous and fretted about his influence over Trump.

“When did Lindsey Graham become our president?” Megyn Kelly, the former Fox News host, posted on social media.

Calling Graham “a homicidal maniac,” she said, "Trump likes and is listening to him, and Trump’s favorite channel" — a reference to Fox News — "is parading him around like a Hefner bunny in stockings on every show.”

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Trump “hears from lawmakers all the time on a number of issues” and he has “very good and candid” rapport with Graham.

“Republicans are supportive of President Trump’s bold decision to launch combat operations and end the threat posed by the Iranian terrorist regime,” Leavitt said in a statement.

Through the years, Graham has taken on and handily defeated primary challengers from the right who didn’t see him as conservative enough for South Carolina, with Graham’s critics arguing that he was too conciliatory and too eager to work out deals with Democrats on issues such as immigration alongside his longtime ally and friend, the late Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona.

During reelection campaigns, Graham tends to emphasize his conservatism. In 2020, when running against Democrat Jaime Harrison, Graham frequently reminded voters that he had passionately defended Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh during Senate confirmation hearings.

On Monday, as his supporters cheered, Graham doubled down on his support for Trump's decision to strike Iran, saying he felt “morale is high” among U.S. armed forces, and sending him back to Washington would help “give them what they need to win a war they can’t afford to lose.”

“I’m running for the Senate to build up a military and use it wisely. I’m running for the Senate to help President Trump, not standing in his way,” Graham said. “Do you think a Democratic candidate would help Trump do what he needs to do?”

Amiri reported from New York.

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., speaks with supporters after filing his reelection paperwork Monday, March 16, 2026, in Columbia, S.C. (AP Photo/Meg Kinnard)

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., speaks with supporters after filing his reelection paperwork Monday, March 16, 2026, in Columbia, S.C. (AP Photo/Meg Kinnard)

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., speaks with supporters after filing his reelection paperwork Monday, March 16, 2026, in Columbia, S.C. (AP Photo/Meg Kinnard)

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., speaks with supporters after filing his reelection paperwork Monday, March 16, 2026, in Columbia, S.C. (AP Photo/Meg Kinnard)

NEW YORK (AP) — A man who spent nearly two decades in prison for a roughly $550 robbery was exonerated and freed Monday, after prosecutors said they now agree he didn't commit the crime.

“It cost me 20 years, but they said they corrected it now. So that's all that matters. So I’m good with that,” Kenneth Windley, 61, said as he left a Brooklyn courthouse, at liberty for the first time since 2007.

A judge threw out his conviction and dismissed his case entirely, at the request of both prosecutors and Windley's lawyers. Prosecutors said new evidence — including confessions from two other men who were convicted of similar robberies — supported his longstanding claim of innocence.

“This case is really a cautionary tale of how things can seem one way but, without careful analysis, not be what it purports to be," Brooklyn District Attorney Eric Gonzalez, a Democrat, said after shaking Windley's hand outside court.

“Had we known what the evidence was, this case should have never happened,” he said, adding that he had apologized privately to Windley.

Windley was arrested in 2005 after buying a stove for his mother with a money order that turned out to be stolen.

It had been snatched from Gerald Ross, 70, by two thieves who followed him home from a trip to a bank and a post office. The thieves put Ross in a chokehold and took money orders, cash, and a bank book from him, prosecutors said in a report released Monday.

Ross regularly got money orders for his rent and life insurance payments at that post office, which helped him and the authorities follow a paper trail after the robbery. The trail soon led to Windley, who had given his name, driver’s license and address when purchasing the stove at an appliance store.

From the start, Windley said he had nothing to do with the robbery. He said he'd simply bought a $542.77 money order at a discount from a couple of acquaintances, who insisted that it was valid but that they couldn't use it for a bureaucratic reason.

“He was duped," one of Windley's lawyers, David Shanies, told the court Monday.

Ross identified Windley as one of the thieves from a photo array and then a live lineup, both of them six weeks or longer after the robbery. Windley testified at his trial, telling jurors how his acquaintances had approached him and sold him the money order. But the jury convicted him in 2007 of robbery. Because of prior felony convictions, he was sentenced to 20 years to life in prison. His appeals failed.

Early on, Windley told prosecutors what he knew about the men who sold him the money order: their nicknames and some information about their legal names. After his conviction, a friend and private investigators helped him flesh out the men's identities and persuade them to come forward about what had happened, according to the D.A.’s report.

In sworn statements and then in interviews with D.A.'s office representatives, the two men said that they had robbed Ross together and that Windley was not involved, according to the report. It called their admissions “compelling.”

It doesn’t give their names, referring to them only as “Suspect 1” and “Suspect 2.” Both are serving prison time on other robbery convictions, according to the D.A.’s office. Those convictions all involved male victims in their 60s and older who were followed home from banks and check-cashing offices in Brooklyn in 2005 and 2006.

If the jury had known those men's identities and robbery records, the information would likely have raised reasonable doubt about the charge against Windley, prosecutors concluded.

No new charges have been brought in the case. The legal time frame for bringing charges ran out years ago, and Ross has died.

Windley, heading off Monday afternoon to celebrate with his family, said he wasn't bitter about what he'd been through.

“I’m just going to move on from there,” he said.

Kenneth Windley, right, shakes hands with Brooklyn District Attorney Eric Gonzalez at the courthouse in the Brooklyn borough of New York, Monday, March 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Jennifer Peltz)

Kenneth Windley, left, leaves the courthouse with his mother, Francina Windley Patterson, in the Brooklyn borough of New York, Monday, March 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Jennifer Peltz)

Kenneth Windley, center, speaks with reporters while accompanied by his fiancée, Donna Carter, left, and attorney David Shanies, right, outside of the courthouse in the Brooklyn borough of New York, Monday, March 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Jennifer Peltz)

Kenneth Windley, right, speaks to reporters while accompanied by his fiancée, Donna Carter, outside the courthouse in the Brooklyn borough of New York, Monday, March 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Jennifer Peltz)

Kenneth Windley, left, leaves a courthouse with his mother, Francina Windley Patterson, in the Brooklyn borough of New York, Monday, March 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Jennifer Peltz)