“Abuse Of Office”: Graham Hit With Formal Ethics Complaint Amid Allegations Of Election Meddling

This arti­cle orig­i­nal­ly appeared on Raw Story

Ethics experts asked the Senate Ethics Committee on Wednesday to look into Sen. Lindsey Graham’s phone call last week with Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, CNN reported.
The three experts — Walter Shaub, a for­mer top ethics watch­dog for the fed­er­al gov­ern­ment, Richard Painter, the chief ethics lawyer for President George W. Bush’s admin­is­tra­tion, and Claire Finkelstein, the direc­tor of the University of Pennsylvania’s Center for Ethics and the Rule of Law — are ask­ing the Senate to look into whether or not Graham made a sug­ges­tion that Raffensperger “dis­en­fran­chise Georgia vot­ers by not count­ing votes law­ful­ly cast for the office of president.”

The let­ter reflect­ed, in part: “If these alle­ga­tions are true, Senator Graham’s con­duct con­sti­tutes an abuse of office and con­duct unbe­com­ing of a sen­a­tor. For the Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee to sug­gest to a state Secretary of State that he refrain from count­ing law­ful votes threat­ens the elec­toral process and dam­ages rep­re­sen­ta­tive democ­ra­cy. The Senate Select Committee should inves­ti­gate this mat­ter and, if it finds Chairman Graham com­mit­ted the alleged mis­con­duct, seek an appro­pri­ate sanc­tion or any oth­er appro­pri­ate remedy.”

The let­ter con­tin­ued, “Secretary Raffensperger’s alle­ga­tion describes extreme mis­con­duct and abuse of sen­a­to­r­i­al author­i­ty. This alleged attempt by Senator Graham to throw the elec­tion for President Trump after the fact by encour­ag­ing the very fraud he pur­ports to be inves­ti­gat­ing threat­ens the fab­ric of our nation by under­min­ing the very thing that makes it a repub­lic, our elec­tions. Even if the com­mit­tee believes only Senator Graham’s account, his call to the state elec­tion offi­cial dur­ing an ongo­ing vote count amounts to mis­con­duct. These alleged acts com­mit­ted by Senator Graham bring dis­cred­it and dis­hon­or upon the Senate and con­sti­tute con­duct unbe­com­ing of a United States Senator. Therefore, we urge the com­mit­tee to open an inves­ti­ga­tion of Senator Graham at once and, if it finds the con­duct occurred as alleged, take the strongest action with­in its author­i­ty to address mis­con­duct by a mem­ber of the Senate.”
Read the let­ter here: https://​assets​.doc​u​ment​cloud​.org/​d​o​c​u​m​e​n​t​s​/​2​0​4​1​2​4​7​2​/​e​t​h​i​c​s​-​c​o​m​p​l​a​i​n​t​-​s​e​n​a​t​o​r​-​l​i​n​d​s​e​y​-​o​-​g​r​a​h​a​m​2​.​pdf