Graham: ‘The Whistleblower Statute Has Become a Dangerous Tool in the Wrong Hands’

Monday on Fox News Channel’s “The Ingraham Angle,” Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) argued the whistleblower statute was being misapplied as it pertained to President Donald Trump and congressional Democrats’ pursuit of impeachment.

The South Carolina Republican said there was a distinction between anonymity and protecting a whistleblower from being fired.

“I really believe the whistleblower statute has become a dangerous tool in the wrong hands,” Graham said. “The whistleblower statute is designed to keep somebody from being fired if they report corruption. It was never designed to keep somebody anonymous.”

Graham laid out why he and his colleagues in the U.S. Senate needed to take a closer look at the whistleblower and other aspects of Trump’s alleged wrongdoings.

“So I like Senator Grassley, but all due respect, you can’t prosecute somebody — impeachment is the political death penalty — based on an anonymous source,” he said. “So yes, Rand is right. We need the whistleblower’s name, we need who they are, and they need to be cross-examined under oath about any biases they may have.”

“Number two, we need to look at whether or not Hunter Biden corruptly engaged in lobbying,” Graham added. “Did Joe Biden asked the prosecutor to be fired because he was investigating his son? And John Solomon, one of your guests coming up, has given us plenty to look at. So I hope Chairman Risch, the foreign intelligence chairman, will open up an investigation about the role of the State Department in all this.”

Follow Jeff Poor on Twitter @jeff_poor