Sen. Lindsay Graham took offense to President Joe Biden’s handling of the Chinese spy balloon incident, telling Fox News host Jesse Waters Monday that he watched the shoot-down over his state South Carolina on TV like the rest of the public.
While on “Jesse Waters Primetime,” Waters asked the senator if he had been briefed about the spy balloon, Graham cackled and said of the latest incident, “No! I watched it on Fox!”
Graham also questioned – half-jokingly – why the Pentagon and the White House didn’t keep him in the loop about the balloon’s destruction: “If we’re going to shoot it down over your state, do you mind?”
The senator from South Carolina later added that waiting to shoot the balloon down until it got off the coast was a result of public pressure, not strategy or foreign policy.
“I don’t believe for one moment they would have shut this balloon down unless somebody saw it over Montana,” Graham said. “I think the only reason they shut it down is ‘cause of the public pressure and there are a lot of questions to be asked here.”
Graham’s three-minute spot with Waters continued to drag the Biden administration in colorful follow-up commentary, underscoring hot-button issues in U.S. foreign policy.
“This is Joe Biden in two buckets and both are bad buckets,” Graham said, noting the administration’s decision to supply Ukraine with weapons after Russia invaded last year, its withdrawal from Afghanistan and more.
“The balloon is indecisive Biden,” Graham said. “Whether he’s decisive or indecisive, he always screws up.”
Towards the end of the segment, Graham’s tone switched from lightheartedly trivial to more serious.
“I don’t know crap about balloons, but I got common sense that if the Chinese got a balloon with three tractor trailers hitched to it, they’re up to no good,” he concluded. “And why would you let ‘em go to South Carolina? This makes no sense, it doesn’t pass the smell test, and this is dangerous – it sends all the wrong signals at the wrong time.”
Watch the full segment in the video above.