Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) will hold a fundraiser for presidential candidate Ted Cruz, CNN reported Thursday.
A draft of the invitation to the fundraising event, obtained by CNN, invites guests to “honor and support a great friend of Israel and the Jewish people,” a meet-and-greet during the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) policy conference in Washington next week.
{mosads}Graham, while acknowledging the differences between him and Cruz, praised the Texas senator Thursday.
“I think Ted Cruz is a reliable Republican, strong on Israel, would repeal and replace ObamaCare, would be good on the Supreme Court,” Graham said in the Senate basement to reporters. “So we have many things in common, but we also have many differences.”
Graham, who ended his own presidential campaign in December, launched a number of insults at Cruz during his campaign, most recently saying his foreign policy chops are “just as wrong as Obama, if not worse.”
In January, Graham said choosing between GOP presidential front-runner Donald Trump and Cruz is akin to deciding whether to be shot or poisoned.
And just last month, he said the GOP has gone “bats—“ crazy and joked that it’s possible to get away with murdering Cruz if it happened in the Senate.
“If you killed Ted Cruz on the floor of the Senate, and the trial was in the Senate, nobody would convict you,” he said.
Graham appeared to come around to a Cruz presidency earlier this month when he said the party might have to rally around him to stop Trump.
“You know Ted Cruz is not my favorite, by any means,” Graham said in an interview with CBS. “But we may be in a position where we have to rally around Ted Cruz as the only way to stop Donald Trump, and I’m not so sure that would work.”
Graham originally endorsed former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush.
The story was corrected on Friday, March 18, to strike a quote attributed to Sen. Graham. The quote, which Graham did not say, appeared because of a staff miscommunication. The Hill apologizes for the error.