Jaime Harrison is chasing Lindsey Graham like a cheetah running down an impala

Opinion by Jonathan Capehart Columnist

July 28, 2020 at 7:01 a.m. EDT

In American politics, some candidates give their opponents a real run for their money. And then there are those candidates who lay chase like a cheetah running down an impala on the Serengeti. Two polls out of South Carolina show that Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R) is the impala to the cheetah that is Democratic challenger Jaime Harrison.

An internal poll from the Harrison campaign released Monday shows that Harrison, the former chair of the South Carolina Democratic Party, within two percentage points of Graham, who garners 43 percent support to 41 percent for Harrison. That poll comes as a super PAC with the not-at-all-subtle title “Lindsey Must Go” revealed a survey of likely voters that shows Harrison (45 percent) within four percentage points of Graham (49 percent).

The money race isn’t even close. Harrison raised nearly $14 million in the second quarter, which is nearly double what he raised in the first quarter. Both were record hauls for the state. By comparison, Graham raised just $8.4 million in the second quarter. The incumbent senator does have a money advantage, though. Graham has $5 million more on hand than his challenger — and he’s going to need every dime of it.

Harrison shouldn’t even be competitive in South Carolina. President Trump won the Palmetto State by 14 percentage points in 2016. The last Democrat elected to the U.S. Senate from South Carolina was the late Ernest F. Hollings in 1998. Yet, data from the Lindsey Must Go poll show why Harrison is seriously in the hunt against Trump’s two-faced golfing buddy. It all boils down to character.

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https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/07/28/jaime-harrison-is-chasing-lindsey-graham-like-cheetah-running-down-an-impala/