The NPR Politics Podcast - Graham survives runoff with help from Trump's super PAC

Episode Date: August 26, 2026

Sen. Darline Graham, R-S.C., beat back a close challenge from Rep. Ralph Norman to win her GOP Senate primary runoff. We look at the race, and how MAGA, Inc., a super PAC affiliated with President Trump, spent big to get her over the finish line.Then, a look at the Social Security trust fund. The mechanism funding Social Security is running out of money, and potential solutions aren't popular. How might Congress fix it?This episode: voting correspondents Miles Parks and Ashley Lopez, and senior national political correspondent Mara Liasson.This podcast was produced and edited by Casey Morell and Bria Suggs.Our executive producer is Muthoni Muturi.Support public media with NPR+ and enjoy perks for over 25 podcasts like this one. This show’s perks include bonus episodes and sponsor-free listening. Learn more at plus.npr.org.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

Today on the show, money. President Trump's preferred candidate won a Republican Senate runoff in South Carolina, but not before Trump's Super PAC stepped in to get her over the finish line. And the fund that pays for Social Security is just a couple years from running out. Why is no one talking about this? It's the NPR Politics Podcast. I'm Miles Parks. I cover voting. I'm Ashley Lopez. I cover politics.

And I'm Mara Liason, senior national political correspondent. And I do want to start with this South Carolina runoff that happened yesterday. Darlene Graham, the sister of late Senator Lindsey Graham, won the Republican primary to be on November's ballot in that state for this Senate seat. She was appointed to the seat when her brother died. But the initial election was pretty close. And then this runoff ended up being pretty close too, right? Yeah, only a couple of percentage points is what she took to win.

So, I mean, this is a political newcomer. A lot of voters didn't know who she is. I think what most people know about Darling Graham is at her birthday. brother was their senator for a long time in South Carolina. So she squared off against Ralph Norman, who's a very conservative member of the House, not very antagonistic to Trump, but this was Donald Trump's pick. And she won, you know, sometimes it's like this with a small electorate's like a primary or runoff or something like that. It's usually the ideological diehard. So Trump did have a lot of sway. Although it is interesting that he felt the need to spend almost a million

dollars from his own pack to get her over that finish line. Right. Norman, very conservative, though Mara, he did endorse one of President Trump's opponents in a previous election, right? Yes, that's right. He endorsed Nikki Haley. She's from South Carolina. And one of the reasons that we were spending so much time watching this primary, even though South Carolina is a very red state, and this is not going to determine who will control the Senate after November. But the reason we were watching was to measure Donald Trump's hold on the Republican Party. We have seen it be incredibly firm. He probably has a stronger hold on his base than any other modern president, but lately, a lot of his endorsed candidates have not won their primaries. And we were waiting to see if that

would also happen in South Carolina. It didn't. The candidate that he endorsed, Darlene Graham, won. As Ashley said, he did have to spend a lot of money to do it. But what was so interesting, to me was about how he campaigned for her. He was at a rally for her recently, and he said this to his supporters. The problem that we have is they say that Trump does great when he's on the ballot, but when he's not on the ballot, his people don't come and they don't vote for senators, congressmen, and other Republicans, and that these people, they're running, they're great, but if Trump isn't actually on the ballot. So, What I really want you to do is pretend, please, that I'm on the ballot.

Just come and vote it's so important. So the thing is that what Donald Trump now, of course, he was also telling Republicans what to do in a general election, come out and vote for Republicans and pretend you're voting for me. But what was so interesting is he sees these races through a very personal lens. And a vote for Darlene Graham was a vote for Trump. And I think he has said, you know, in that in that bite we just heard, that when he's not, on the ballot, people don't come out. So the big question is not only how strong he is in these primaries, but also can he get his voters to come out in a year where voters are very sour? They're

angry at incumbents. They're not happy with the president. Even Republicans have soured on some of his initiatives. They don't like high prices. They don't like inflation. They don't like the war in Iran. So this is Donald Trump once again seeing the presidency in very, very personalist terms. Who knows how much of this is personal, like, political score settling because, as we mentioned, Ralph Norman, endorsed Nikki Haley. But, you know, I do think, like, a non-incumbent, a political newcomer, if it wasn't someone who was so unknown, maybe would have performed a little better. Like, who knows? I think the way that Darling Graham talked about foreign policy would in other terms, ding her probably a little harder. But, I mean, who knows if Trump's endorsement did play a big role here?

although I will reiterate, I do think like this is maybe not the best test case of his endorsement power, mostly because this is such, this was a primary race. That's true. But I would actually counter that, Ashley, and say to me, this is a more interesting test case of Trump's endorsement because Graham, to me, seemed like somewhat of a flawed candidate. I mean, I do, I want to listen to a little bit of the tape from that debate, which was hosted by the South Carolina Republican Party, moderated by Newsmax. And Graham has asked about whether basically Taiwan and the.

South China Sea should be priorities for the United States. And here's what she said. I'm just going to be honest here. I'm not on national security. I'm not that informed on national security. But I do support the military. My brother was in the Air Force for 33 years. So I will do everything I can to support the military. My dad was in the Army. I'm not a polished politician up here. National security is not my thing. me, that is just so interesting then that she still was able to win this election because I do think for some candidates, especially for political unknowns, where people are trying to define themselves with this couple weeks leading up to the election, this could have been something

that sunk her campaign and it did not. In another era, it might have. She just said national security is not her thing. Turns out that Donald Trump's endorsement is her thing. And that's what mattered here. Yeah. And a lot of voters right now, I mean, the biggest frustration, Mar and I hear every month from voters is that Trump and Republicans are in general to focus on things like the war in Iran and foreign policy. America's relationship with Israel is something that seems to be consuming, especially Democrats right now in their primary. And voters are like, hey, I cannot afford groceries. I cannot afford gas. Can you please focus on that? This is the political moment that both parties have to deal with, which is that voters by and large do not care about that much about what is going on

outside of the country. They are very squeezed economically right here, and they want to hear politicians talk about that. So, you know, I don't think this hurt her. The last thing I want to ask about Mara is the money question, because this super PAC that's aligned with President Trump, MAGA Inc, came into this race late, spent a bunch of money, seemed, I mean, just based on the result, to get the result that they wanted. And MAGA Inc. has a lot more money in the bank, something like $400 million. And so I guess I'm wondering if we've talked a lot on this podcast about questioning how important having a lot of money is. I mean, go back to 2024, Kamala Harris, the amount of money that was flowing into that campaign ahead of that election.

I guess does that money matter? And is this showing potentially how it could matter? Yes. Having a tremendous amount more money than your opponent matters. You have to have enough money to compete. But the disparity in this cycle is so extreme. I mean, we've talked about this before. The Democratic National Committee is in debt. The Republican National Committee is sitting on hundreds of millions of dollars. So under a previous election, pre-Trump, we would say, whoa, he's spending all this money to help somebody win a Republican primary in a super red state. Why isn't he spending it on battleground states where the control of Congress hangs in the balance? Well, in this case, it doesn't really matter. He has so much money that they can spend it on

anything they want. They don't have to pick and choose. He spent about a little bit less than a million about $827,000 to help Graham get over the finish line here. And if he wants to, so far, his MAGA ink has been very stingy, but they have plenty of time between now and November to change that. Yeah. And Mar and I have observed this other thing happening with mostly undecided and swing voters, which is like they're not paying attention until the very end here. money at the very end of a race could make a big difference, especially if you're pushing out, you know, text messages to the right voters who maybe haven't been paying attention until now and decided, well, I'm going to wait till the very last minute to make a decision, which in close elections, which a lot of these elections will be close, could make a humongous difference. All right. Let's take a quick break. And when we come back, one of those third rails of politics, we're going to touch it. And we're back. And we're switching gears now to talk about Social Security. This is something that. that is not top of mind for a lot of voters or candidates this cycle, but maybe it should be. Ashley, this is something you have been thinking a lot about. And let's just start with the basics.

How is Social Security funded? Well, it's funded by payroll taxes. So most folks who have a job have probably noticed if they're the kind of people who look at what comes out of their paycheck. There is a line there that goes to Social Security. So it's 6.2 percent of what you earn is paid for by you, another 6.2. percent is paid by your employer. And if you're self-employed, that's 12.4. Easy math, right, percent of what you make goes to Social Security. And, you know, there's also bonds and stuff that these all sit in some trust accounts, basically, that the U.S. Treasury manages. And that pot of money is what pays for

the Social Security checks that go out to people who are retired. Currently, currently. But the most important thing to remember is your Social Security is not sitting somewhere in an account waiting for you to retire. Your social security checks go to pay the social security benefits of people who are currently retired. And when you retire, your social security is going to be paid for by workers who are then in the workplace. The problem is they're not going to be enough of them. Right. So lay out the problem for us here, Ashley. My understanding here, tell me if this is correct, is that basically there are just, there's more money going out at this point than coming in and that we're coming up to a head pretty soon, right?

Right, because baby boomers are retiring. So there's going to be an influx of people who are going to be retiring soon and drawing out from that pot of money. And I mean, the expectation is that, you know, there will be money in that account because it would take for everyone to lose their jobs, which is important for people to remember. It would take like mass unemployment, like no one having a job for that pot of money to be completely empty. But the problem right now is that more is coming out and less is coming in because the folks paying in right now are not quite as big of a population as the baby boomers. So it is a math problem that is pretty easy to understand, but it is a political problem that is a lot more thorny. We are discussing this because this is a huge problem that's going to affect everyone. And it's not a

secret why they call Social Security the third rail of American politics, because it's a program that everybody relies on, and politicians have tried and failed in the past to come up with a way to keep it solvent for future generations. And the reason why I'm reporting on this is because there is a pretty big deadline coming up. In six years, the Social Security Trust Fund that I mentioned, is going to be depleted. So a lot of like any sort of excesses that were there before, interests on bonds. Like the payroll taxes I mentioned is just not going to be enough to to cover what's coming out. And according to the Social Security Administration, the trust fund is going to be depleted by 2032, which means that across the board, if nothing is done,

there will be 22% cuts to the checks that people receive in the retirement Social Security program. So that is huge. If a lot of seniors rely on those Social Security checks to pay for things like their mortgage, groceries, I mean, big things. So it will be. a pretty catastrophic event financially for a lot of people. And six years sounds like a lot of time, but politically speaking, in order to get a thorny issue like we just mentioned, something that is the third rail of politics, to get both parties to agree on something, is actually not a lot of time. And it's also not a lot of time to get voters up to speed on what their options are. And I should say, six years is also the term that everyone who's running for Senate right now

is going to be in for. So like, if you are running for Senate right now, Six years from now, you will be in office presumably that whole time. This will be your problem. People should be asking about this and they're not. It is kind of shocking that every single Senate candidate is not being asked this question since it is going to fall right into their lap. But, you know, this is one of the reasons that voters are so cynical because polls have shown that young voters do not believe that they will get Social Security benefits. They are paying into the program as they have to. Every single paycheck, it gets to Social Security taxes get deducted. But they are very, very pessimistic about whether they'll get anything back. And that just adds to an angry, sour, cynical electorate. So I want to talk about where this is headed then because the problem is actually not that complicated.

Anyone who has a bank account understands the idea of spending more money than you are taking in, right? And so what are the solutions or what are the potential solutions? The solutions are extremely simple and politically toxic. You either have to cut benefits or raise taxes on someone. That's all you can do. There's nothing else that you can do. And every time in the past, and we went through this about 20 years ago, when Congress and the White House formed a bipartisan commission tried to come up with an answer,

they couldn't. It was politically too toxic. They weren't willing to cut benefits and they weren't willing to raise taxes. And they just kicked the can down the road. And now we're six years away from D-Day. And the reason why this is particularly complicated is because the folks who will probably bear the brunt of this if Congress decides to act are wealthier people. So what's on the table right now is cutting benefits for wealthier Americans. That's one option. So if you make, you know, if you have a certain amount of money, you're not going to be getting that social security check, even though you've been presumably paying into social security the entire time you've been working, which, you know, is a less popular.

option, but it is on the table. The other option here is eliminating the tax cap for Social Security. If you don't know what that is, don't feel bad. A lot of people don't. So what exists now is if you make up to $184,500, you are taxed for the full amount of that money. But if you make more than that, any dollar you make after $184,500 is not taxed. So basically, if you make like $5,500, you make like $500,000, you are paying percentage-wise a much smaller amount of payroll taxes for Social Security than someone making $50,000. And there is a proposal, a bipartisan effort from Senators Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Marino to get rid of that tax cap altogether. And that seems to be a little more politically popular because a lot of voters see this as simply a fairness issue.

And that would be an example of populism on the left and right coming together. And that is a new thing that we're seeing in American politics. And don't forget, one of the reasons Donald Trump won was because he did something very unorthodox for a Republican. He said, I will not touch a hair on the head of Social Security or Medicare. And raising the tax cap, making sure that everyone pays the same percentage of their earned income to the Social Security system is one way of staying true to that. So I have to admit something. This is one of those things, this income cap for Social security tax is the thing that I did not know about. As somebody who hosts a politics podcast, I was talking to my father-in-law a couple weeks ago and he just started receiving social

security and he mentioned this income cap that over $185,000 or whatever. And I was like, oh, no, you must be misunderstanding that. That can't actually be the cap. Did he think it was fair? Oh, I mean, we're not going to get into it. I'm not going to start outing my father-in-law's politics or his opinions about things, Mara. But we were discussing this. And I went to my phone and I was like, that can't be right. And I was like, oh, my gosh. It is right. So I guess, why? isn't this more of a thing that people are talking about? You know, I don't know either, but I will say it's very interesting to watch voters learn about this in real time because Mara and I have the pleasure of watching swing voters across the country every month. And this was something we've talked about for the past

three months, is social security's insolvency problems. And a lot of folks did not know that this existed. And across the board, as Mara mentioned, like, this is something that a lot of voters come together on. They see this as really unfair. And the history of why. it's like this, you know, I think it's complicated, but moving forward when, you know, the political moment we're in, which is there's supreme staggering inequality wage-wise right now. And two, during Trump's first year back in office, there was the big beautiful bill. That was a massive transfer of wealth from the poor to the wealthy. I think the politics of raising taxes on wealthy people is not what it was 10 years ago. So I'm seeing the like voter sentiment pretty clearly

leaning towards eliminating that tax cap. The question is at what rate? There have been other proposals that say we won't eliminate the tax cap until more than $400,000 a year in income. So everyone in between 185 and 400 won't get taxed. But, you know, I don't know. I don't know what the politics of how. The politics of that is deciding what number, what income is middle class. Right. But I do think that the bottom line here is that social security is an example of an utter failure of leadership. Members of Congress know this is coming down the pike. They know this is happening and they haven't been willing to take any political risks to try to solve it. Yeah. And this is mostly what I'm hearing from people who follow this closely, which is just

how little the public knows about what's coming because cutting benefits or raising taxes, that's something people are going to notice. And you don't want them to notice it when it goes into effect. You want them to be read in, anticipating and also weighing in before a decision. is made because this would be a shock to most voters, no matter where it goes, whether it's benefits to people who have paid into a system for a long time or raising taxes on them from one year to the next. It's going to be a shock to a lot of voters. All right. Well, we can leave it there for today. I'm Miles Parks. I cover voting. I'm Ashley Lopez. I cover politics. And I'm Mara Lyons, senior national political correspondent. And thank you for listening to the NPR Politics

podcast.