After armed pro-Trump rioters stormed the Capitol in an attempt to subvert the democratic process on Wednesday, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) appealed to his fellow congressmen in an impassioned, albeit odd, speech. His address immediately made waves, and many social media users voiced their suspicions that the southern senator was inebriated on the floor of the Senate.
Congress gathered Wednesday to certify the Electoral College vote in favor of President-elect Joe Biden. After a crowd of armed Trump supporters stormed the Capitol, however, senators were forced to take shelter and delay the proceedings. After hours of turmoil, the rioters were finally removed from the Capitol, and the certification proceedings continued.
The riot was enough to convince a number of staunch congressional Trump supporters to nix their plans to oppose Biden’s election. Graham was among those ranks, taking to the Senate floor and pleading with his Republican colleagues to certify the vote.
“Trump and I, we’ve had a hell of a journey,” Graham said. “I hate it to end this way. Oh my God, I hate it. From my point of view, he’s been a consequential president. All I can say is, count me out. Enough is enough.”
The typically mild-mannered senator was uncharacteristically boisterous in his speech. He appeared to slur several words and gesticulated wildly to his fellow senators.
Several viewers postulated that Graham was intoxicated during his speech, in an effort to find the courage to oppose Trump’s will. Whatever it was that got him there, the senator finally mustered the courage to stand—somewhat—against the president.
Graham went on to list several states in which the Trump team’s attempts to prove its election fraud claims failed miserably.
“I don’t buy this,” said a red-faced Graham at the end of his address. “Enough is enough. We gotta end it.”
Many viewers saw the moment as Graham’s official, public breakup with Trump.
“Lindsey Graham is drunk and is breaking up with Trump on live television,” sports reporter Derek Montilla tweeted.
“Um, as a touring musician I believe I am qualified to weigh in here and this man is drunk,” wrote Mikel Jollett, frontman of the band Airborne Toxic Event.
Others thought Graham had a drinking buddy or two. Did Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) seem a little… loose in his remarks? Quite a few people thought he and Graham tossed back a few brews together before arriving on the Senate floor.
The Twitter jokes poured in faster than the local IPA on tap at the nearest D.C. brewpub.
Not everyone could find the humor in the situation. Many people were enraged at Graham’s seemingly lighthearted tone after armed rioters threatened U.S. democracy, leaving at least one woman dead and several people injured.
“Drunk Lindsey Graham thought it was a good time for some good old Southern humor after an insurrection that left a woman dead and the Capitol in shambles,” tweeted Fred Wellman, the senior advisor for veterans affairs at Project Lincoln. “It’s all just a little misunderstanding.”
Wellman was far from the only person to condemn Graham’s tone.
The situation at the Capitol on Wednesday was about as far as you could get from humorous, but as always, Twitter users found plenty to joke about with Graham’s suspected intoxication.