lindsey graham

On the last day for candidates to remove their names from the South Carolina primary ballot, the Palmetto State's senior senator, Lindsey Graham, dropped out of the presidential race. 

After breaking the news to his supporters on a Monday morning conference call, Graham made the announcement  publicly in a video message Monday.

Sen. Lindsey Graham says the way to prevent more mass shootings like the one in San Bernardino, Calif., on Wednesday is to "make ISIL the losers they are."  

The South Carolina Republican, who is running for president, told reporters that an all-out war against the terror organization would "probably fix the problem more than gun control."  

Sen. John McCain is standing by his man in the GOP presidential race, but that isn't keeping him from weighing in on other senators in the running.  

"I'm one of those old-fashioned people that believe in loyalty, and I'll stay with Lindsey Graham until he either succeeds or fails," McCain told reporters at a Christian Science Monitor breakfast. "That's what my life has been all about."  

Sen. Lindsey Graham has tried in vain to make the GOP presidential race a fight over who has the best plan to crush the Islamic State. But as coordinated terror attacks on Paris dominate headlines, will primary voters finally listen to the South Carolina Republican?  

Graham has long pushed for military intervention in Syria, with a substantial ground component. He told CQ Roll Call Monday that he hoped his message would pick up traction, particularly in New Hampshire — host of the first-in-the-nation presidential primary and where he will travel this weekend with Senate Armed Services Chairman John McCain.  

President Barack Obama made clear Monday he disagrees with critics who believe he should send thousands of U.S. military troops to Iraq and Syria to counter the Islamic State, after the terrorist group claimed responsibility for the deadly attacks in Paris. A defiant Obama said conventional military strategies and operations will not work against the violent extremist group, also known as ISIS or ISIL, and warned Republican lawmakers and others that “we play into their hands when we act as if ISIL is a state.”  

“This is not what’s going on here,” Obama said during a news conference from the G20 summit in Turkey. “These are killers.”  

With Speaker Paul D. Ryan's comments about immigration Sunday, the top two Republicans in Congress have now declared dead the prospects of an overhaul before the 2016 elections.  

In the aftermath of 2012, when Latinos made up 10 percent of the electorate and President Barack Obama was re-elected resoundingly, Republican lawmakers and strategists predicted the GOP's White House ambitions were directly tied to the passage of comprehensive immigration legislation. Many of those voices haven't changed their tune. White House ‘Disappointed’ by Court’s Immigration Decision 

When it comes to personal wealth, the five senators running for president aren’t exactly rolling in cash — by congressional standards, that is. Ted Cruz , the richest senator running for president, doesn’t even crack the top 100 on the Roll Call Wealth of Congress Index, an annual ranking of members by minimum net worth. The Texas Republican comes in at No. 141, with a minimum net worth of at least $1.8 million. The median American net worth was nearly $69,000 in 2011, the year for which the most recent data is available from the Census Bureau.  

The 10 Richest Members of Congress in 2015

For a presidential cycle known for upending conventional political wisdom, one thing certainly hasn't changed: It's hard to vote in the Senate if you're campaigning across the country.  

Like a young(er) John McCain from 2007, Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., who missed every vote last week, leads the Senate in truancy for the year to date, voting just 68.7 percent of the time, according to CQ Vote Watch .  

With 83 percent of Americans  saying they disapprove of the way Congress is doing its job, one might expect presidential candidates and their savvy political teams to keep themselves at a distance.  

But even in this year of the outsider — where, from the revolt in the House to the polls in the presidential race, it might appear the strength of the establishment is on the downturn — candidates seeking the highest office in the land are competing for their endorsements in what has been described as the “Invisible Primary .”  On Friday, Sen. Bernard Sanders, the Vermont independent giving establishment favorite Hillary Rodham Clinton her biggest challenge for the Democratic nomination, is expected to receive  an endorsement from Arizona Rep. Raúl M. Grijalva during a campaign rally in Tuscon.