Of America's 100 senators, Lindsey Graham was perhaps the most influential since Donald Trump's return to office last year. His close friendship with the President and almost unfettered access to the White House played an outsized role in informing Mr Trump's worldview.
After his sudden death on Saturday at the age of 71, Mr Graham's absence from foreign policy debates will be noticeable in Washington and capitals around the world, where he was known not just for his hawkish views on Iran and his indefatigable backing of Israel and Ukraine, but also for his support for Gulf allies and his push to deepen US security ties with the region.
So recognisable was Mr Graham on the global stage that some viewed him as a sort of shadow secretary of state, showing up at global summits and operating with Mr Trump's blessing.
He was in Kyiv last week for what Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said was his 10th visit since Russia's full-scale invasion in 2022. Mr Graham was feted as an elder statesman as he used his platform to push for the US Congress to approve a bill to impose sanctions on Russia on Friday, one day before his death from an aortic tear.
He "was here with our people when it was most needed", Mr Zelenskyy said on X.
William Wechsler, senior director at the Atlantic Council's Rafic Hariri Centre and Middle East Programmes, said Mr Graham came from an older generation of US senators who once would immerse themselves in the minutiae of foreign policy, something that has become rare today.
Senators today "all have talking points, but very few can really speak with coherence", Mr Wechsler said.
"Whether you agreed with him or disagreed with him, he knew his stuff. It's another mark in the changing of a generation, and it's really unfortunate for the United States."
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US Republican Senator Lindsey Graham has died at the age of 71 after a brief and sudden illness. Reuters -
UAE President Sheikh Mohamed meets Mr Graham in Abu Dhabi, in February 2026. Wam -
Mr Graham meets Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Kyiv, amid Russia's war on Ukraine, in May 2025. Reuters -
With Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US ambassador to Israel David Friedman, in the border region between Israel and Syria, in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, in 2019. Reuters -
Mr Graham addresses a news conference in Washington, in 2013, after the reported arrest of Sulaiman Abu Ghaith, the son-in-law of Osama Bin Laden, who was taken into custody in the Middle East and was allegedly being held in New York. AFP -
Nouri Al Maliki, Iraq's prime minister at the time, meets, from left, US ambassador to Baghdad Zalmay Khalizad, and US senators John Thune, Lindsey Graham, Susan Collins, Joseph Lieberman and John McCain, in Baghdad, 2006. AFP -
The late US senator John McCain and Mr Graham during a hearing on Capitol Hill, in 2006. AFP -
Mr Graham with Donald Trump, now US President, and, from left, actor Leslie Odom Jr, Tuskegee airmen Dr Roscoe Brown, Wilfred Difore, Floyd Carter and Dabney Ian Montgomery, and actor Michael B Jordan, during the NFL And Red Tails' Salute To The Tuskegee Airmen On Veterans' Day Weekend, in New Jersey, 2011. AFP -
Mr Graham during a hearing on gun control in Washington, in 2013, months after the mass shooting at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. AFP -
Alongside George W Bush, US president at the time, in 2007. AFP -
Mr Graham, right, with senator Joseph Biden, who would go on to become US president, and Lee Ewing editor of Aerospace Daily, in 2004. AFP -
Mr Graham, at the time a US representative, talks to reporters after a meeting of the the 'House Managers', members of the House Judiciary Committe who would serve as prosecutors in the impeachment trial against US president Bill Clinton to be held in the US Senate in early January 1999. AFP
Mr Wechsler said Mr Graham's voice would be missed on many topics, including pushing for the establishment of ties between Israel and Saudi Arabia as part of a long-sought expansion of the Abraham Accords.
There are "few members of Congress that were as committed to the Abraham Accords, that were as committed to Israel, that was committed to our relationships in the Gulf, that were committed to the US playing a significant role as a security guarantor throughout the Middle East region," he said.
Mr Graham immersed himself in Middle East policy and served on the Senate committee on armed services for more than 20 years, for much of which the US was at war in Iraq and Afghanistan. He also served as an Air Force lawyer during the 1980s and the 1990s.
Mr Graham was often regarded as a hawk and spent years lobbying for the US to attack Iran. He visited the UAE and Saudi Arabia in February, 10 days before the US and Israeli strikes on Iran sparked the current conflict.
His pressure on Mr Trump over Iran is thought to have played a part in persuading the President to go to war. He was disappointed when Mr Trump announced a ceasefire in April and was proved correct in his scepticism that US and Iranian negotiators had much to work on.
"The supposed negotiating document, in my view, has some troubling aspects but time will tell," Mr Graham posted on X on April 8 as the ceasefire was announced.
The late senator's steadfast support for Ukraine bucked his Republican Party's Make America Great Again faction, which has often tended to favour Moscow over Kyiv.
He is credited with helping to engineer the current rapprochement between Mr Trump and Mr Zelenskyy, and his death has provoked anxiety in Kyiv as it is not clear who from the Republicans will pick up his mantle. There does, however, appear to be bipartisan support to pass his Russia sanctions bill, which would place a 500 per cent tariff on imports from any country buying Russian oil.
Mr Graham spoke to Mr Trump on the phone about his latest trip to Kyiv and the sanctions bill, just hours before his death.
The relationship between the two golfing partners is perhaps remarkable given its rocky beginnings. In 2015, as Mr Trump was first running for the White House, Mr Graham called him "a race-baiting, xenophobic, religious bigot" and said he did not represent the Republican Party.
After the January 6, 2021 attack on the US Capitol, Mr Graham said he'd had enough of Mr Trump.
"All I can say is count me out. Enough is enough," he said. But his anger soon abated and he rejoined Team Trump.
South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster on Monday picked Mr Graham's sister, Darline Graham Nordone, to complete the remainder of the late senator's term, which expires in January.
