Sen. Lindsey Graham told one of of his staffers that he was experiencing chest pains and to call 911 shortly before his sudden death Saturday night, one of Graham’s Republican colleagues told reporters Monday.
The comments by Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) shed new light on Graham’s final hours after he returned from a trip to Ukraine and prepared to get back to work following Congress’ post-4th of July recess, despite feeling under the weather.
“My former scheduler was Lindsey’s scheduler, and one of my staff members was with that scheduler the night Lindsey called,” said Tuberville, adding that the two aides were watching a World Cup soccer match at a Washington, DC-area restaurant.
“Lindsey called [and] basically said, ‘Listen, I’m having chest pains. You know, I need to do something,’” the former college football coach recounted. “[She said,] ‘Did you call 911?’ And he goes, ‘No, that’s reason I called you.’ And so she called 911 … By the time she got there, 911 had knocked the door down, and they were working on him.”
Attempts to reach Graham’s scheduler were not immediately successful.
Emergency dispatch audio previously reviewed by The Post indicates that paramedics were dispatched to Graham’s Capitol Hill townhouse around 8:30 p.m. Saturday. Shortly before 9 p.m., emergency personnel reported that CPR was in progress, and a man at the house was suffering from cardiac arrest.
A neighbor later shared photos of an older man being taken from Graham’s house on a wheeled stretcher and loaded into an ambulance around 9:30 p.m.
Graham’s office announced his death shortly after 2 a.m. Sunday, and the DC medical examiner’s office issued a preliminary finding that his death was caused by an aortic dissection brought about by arteriosclerotic cardiovascular disease.
Axios reported earlier Monday that Graham had told another person Saturday evening that he was feeling unwell, and would go to the doctor following a scheduled Sunday morning appearance on NBC News’ “Meet The Press.”
“I can’t die now,” Graham joked, according to the report. “I still need to do the Russia sanctions, get Iran sorted out and do Israeli-Saudi normalization.”
President Trump, who appeared on “Meet The Press” in Graham’s stead, confirmed to moderator Kristin Welker that the two had also spoken Saturday “maybe in the [7 p.m. hour].”
“He sounded a little tired, but perfect, but a little bit tired,” Trump said. “He had a right to be. Man, he was a worker. He was really a worker. But he sounded great actually. But he actually said he was tired.”
As stunned senators returned to work Monday, Tuberville said that the South Carolinian “worked himself to death.”
“Most of us have families,” the Alabama Republican said. “He didn’t have any family, and if we had a couple of days off, he went to that airport. He went somewhere to try to work out something for our country.”
