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Lindsey Graham Warns of IRAN NUCLEAR Threat to Global Security

Senator Lindsey Graham delivers a powerful speech calling for regime change in Iran, highlighting its extremist ideology, nuclear ambitions, and decades of sponsoring terrorism. He compares Iran’s leadership to religious Nazis and warns against repeating the mistakes of the 1930s. Graham urges Americans to stand with Israel and act before it’s too late. Watch this urgent message on U.S. national security, Middle East peace, and global stability.
 

Transcript:

Senator Graham: (00:00)
Thank you. I'd like to be recognized to make some comments about the conflict we're watching unfold on our television between Iran, Israel, and now the United States. Someone asked me, what is this, uh, talk all about? I think a good tide would be is what is this all about, uh, to the American people? What is this all about? Lemme tell you what it's all about. 

Senator Graham: (00:28)
It's all about religion. A fanatical strain of schism is now, uh, in charge of Iran and they have three goals to purify Islam. And about 80% of Islam is Sunni. Saudi Arabia is the center of that, uh, part of the religion to purify Islam and the image of the ayatollah to destroy the Jewish state to drive us outta the Mid East because we're infidels. This is not a democracy. It's a theocracy. And if you got any time on your hands, go on the internet and check out the theological basis of this regime. You would understand why Israel has to get this right as well as we do. But it was not always that way. Iran is not, uh, inherently a radical group of people, a radical place. As a matter of fact, it is a very cultured place. Used to be one of the real pearls of the mid East. So before 1979, Iran shared intelligence had economic ties to military cooperation, uh, with Israel and the United States. This is from 1950 for being, uh, Guian. The founder of the first president of Israel is talking to an Iranian diplomat in Jerusalem. And, uh, Iran had a very vibrant Jewish population, so it's not always been this way. So what happened? 

Senator Graham: (02:07)
They had a revolution in 1979 to 1981. There was an uprising in Iran that led to the installing of the Ayatollah as the leader of Iran. Uh, the first, uh, ayatollah, uh, Khomeini. And now we're on the second one, Khomeini. Now, what is this thing all about? These are students pouring over the US Embassy and our embassy personnel. 50 American hostages were held for 444 days by these, uh, nut jobs. They were, uh, subjected to intense physical and psychological torture throughout their captivity, such as mock executions, beating solitary confinement, and very bad living conditions. So this is what they did when they took over. They came after us, held our people hostage and treated us very brutally. In 1984, the United States made Iran a state sponsor of terrorism under US law. Because of the way the Iranian regime under the Ayatollah was conducting himself, they were, um, wreaking havoc throughout the region. 

Senator Graham: (03:26)
And they were doing things against Israel in the United States that justified their designation in 1984 as a state sponsor of terrorism. And that has not changed. Now why are they state sponsor of Tists? Because they're terrorist and they support terrorist Hezbollah. $700 million we project, uh, is, uh, was given to run by Hezbollah. It's almost their entire budget. Uh, they're a terrorist group, mainly in Lebanon of the Shia branch of the tree. Hamas, who conducted the October 7th attack against, uh, Israel. Israel projects that 93% Hamas' mil military budget came from Iran. And we have the ties. All of their missiles and rockets came from Iran. We've got Shiite groups in Iraq funded by Iran. Now why are they estate sponsor of terrorism? 'cause they sponsor terrorism all over the world. And they did it with petro dollars, uh, from the Iran nuclear deal and other sources of revenue, which was a really bad idea. 

Senator Graham: (04:42)
And that's why Trump pulled out. Here's the reporting. Over the period here, Hamas, Iran Alliance captured documents exposed decades long tariff funding. So when Israel began to liberate Gaza from Hamas and drive out Hamas, uh, terrorist, they found a treasure trove of documents showing the history between Hamas, bla Iran, uh, suitcase stuffed with cash, uh, US flow of, uh, funds to Yemen to help the hoos. What else have they done other than funding terrorist groups they've threatened to kill American officials, president Trump, Brian Hook, general McKenzie, Robert O'Brien, Mike Pompeo, former Secretary of Defense, mark Esper, all these people involved in the, uh, Soleimani attack. Now, why did we go after So Soleimani? Because he was the leader of the more radical elements of their military that had been targeting Americans. And he was planning to attack our forces in Iraq and Trump took him out. 

Senator Graham: (05:59)
1983, uh, Beirut Barracks bombing Hezbollah supported by Iran, Cobar Towers bombing in Saudi Arabia. Terrorist groups supported by Iran. That's why their terrorist, they have been coming after our interest. They've attacked our shipping and the Red Sea, the ties have, and they couldn't fire one missile without, uh, Iranian support 'cause that's where all their rockets come from. Now, some cast of characters here, the recent new president was sworn in in uh, Iran. During the swearing in of the Iranian president, the crowd started chanting death to America. Death to America during the swearing in of the new president. Not long ago, July 30th, 2024, not quite a year ago. So people wonder what they're up to. Let me tell you what they're up to. They're up to enacting a religious agenda that has no place for anybody but them. If you're a Christian, they wanna destroy your faith. If you're Jewish, they wanna wipe you off the planet. 

Senator Graham: (07:11)
And if you're a Muslim and you don't agree with them, which most don't, they wanna take over the entire faith and make you bend a knee to their view. These people are religious fanatics. What did this all about? Religion. Do you want any of these people to have a nuclear weapon? I don't. They're religious Nazis. Now what are they? Are there any telltale signs that may tell us what they're up to? Do you really have to be Sherlock Holmes to figure this out? This is a missile in Iran. In Hebrew it says Death to Israel. This is the frigging missile they took a photo of and Hebrew said, death to Israel. Wonder what they wanna do with that. Israel, uh, missile, if you're confused about this regime, you should not be allowed to drive 'cause you're endangered yourself and others. If you think this is not our conflict, you've missed a lot. 

Senator Graham: (08:10)
You've been like sleep at the switch since 1979. You don't know anything about these people. You're talking gibberish. If you don't think this is our concern, look what they've done. They've attacked Americans. They have American blood on their hands. They're trying to build a nuclear bomb. And what are the targets? Is us. How do I know that? 'cause that's what they say. Last July, they were chanting death to America while they were swearing in the President. We don't do that here. Why? Because we're not crazy. These people are crazy. The Iranian people are not. But the people ruling the place are fanatical religious Nazis. And if you don't think it's our concern, you really have missed a lot. You need to study before you talk. 

Senator Graham: (09:00)
And if that's not enough, the missile that says Death to Israel. Let's see, when was this? Uh, 2015. Amid nuke talks I told us, says, death to America. This is during the negotiations that Obama had. So in 2022, they had 95 pounds of highly enriched uranium at 60%. Is there a commercial purpose for uranium enriched at 60%? No. And 20, 25, 3 years later, they have 900 pounds of this stuff. So clearly they're not stopping their enrichment program. They're accelerating it and they're enriching at a level that has no commercial purpose. They actually have one reactor in a run. The fuel for that reactor comes from Russia. They haven't taken one gram of their enrichment program to run the peaceful reactor they claim they want. And to run a reactor, you need to enrich between three and a half and 5%, not 60. Now, weapons grade, uh, enrichment is 90%. 60 to 90 is like walking across the street. So if you can't figure out what they've been up to, again, you should not be allowed to drive. They're trying to build nuclear weapons. They're making material consistent with a bomb, not a peaceful nuclear power plant. They chant death to America. They chant death to Israel. They kill their own people. They're the larger sponsor of terrorism on the planet. They've been that way since 1979. Wonder what they wanna do. 

Senator Graham: (10:49)
The a told us nuclear ambitions have been spread and said for decades. Now, I take him serious. Hitler wrote a book. Nobody believed he wanted to kill all the Jews they should have. Hitler wrote a book about a race. People should have taken him seriously. They wrote it off as just talk. They excused Hitler's provocative behavior saying he's just saying these things. Well, we know that didn't work out too well. Last month was the 80th anniversary of the end of World War ii, the Nazi regime. One of the centerpieces of the Nazi regime was to kill the Jewish people. They put the Jewish people in concentration camps, gas camp, uh, gas chambers. And they tried to extinguish an entire race of people. Our Jewish brothers and sisters killing 6 million Just a few years ago. The Jewish people got back to the numbers before the war. 

Senator Graham: (11:53)
80 years later, we're having a discussion about what should we do as civilized people regarding Iran. I tell you what we should do. We should do something different than we did with Hitler. 'cause if we do the same old thing there goes Israel and eventually us. So their nuclear ambitions are not to build peaceful nuclear fire plants and fuel them. They're making en their, their enrichment program is designed to make bombs. They intend to use these bombs 'cause their religious fanatics. Does anybody doubt If Adolf Hitler had a bomb, he would've used it. If you doubt the Ito would not use a bomb against the state of Israel. You don't understand his religion. What drove Hitler? A sick, twisted, distorted view of the master race. These people wanna master religion, not a master race. They want to dominate the world religiously. That's what they're all about. They export terrorism in the name of religion. They support groups that want to take down secular regimes. They want a master religion like the Nazis wanted a master race. And let me tell you what our friends in Israel are saying, hell no once is enough. So what should Israel do? 

Senator Graham: (13:33)
Here's what Israel should do. They should fight back to the American people. What would our country do if there was one missile shot into South Carolina or Alabama from a foreign power that killed our citizens? Everybody in South Carolina and Alabama would be wanting to end the terror and go after the people who did it and it would be the entire nation. Why should we expect Israel to tolerate what we wouldn't tolerate? There's been over a thousand missiles shot into Israel since their founding. People have been trying to kill them all. Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis have one thing in common. They're all funded by Iran. All the weapons come from the Iranians. What is this all about? Killing the Jews and eventually us and dominating the world religiously. If you think that's weird, then you need to get on the internet and listen to what they're doing. 

Senator Graham: (14:31)
You need to watch their behavior and they mean what they say. And don't be, uh, like the people in the thirties that got it wrong. Israel's not gonna let it get, get it wrong the second time. Donald Trump, God bless President Donald J. Trump. I am so glad he won. What has he tried to do? Make peace. Not war. He gave the ayatollah 60 days to find a peaceful settlement regarding their enrichment program. They could have nuclear power, but they can't enrich their 20 nations that have nuclear power to get the fuel for the reactors outside their country. We would've done that for Iran. They were tapping him along. 61 days go by and the rest is history. They're not interested in peace. They're interested in fulfilling a religious agenda that has no place for us or the state of Israel. Hitler didn't want peace. There was not a part of the country you could give him to stop him from enacting his sick and twisted agenda. 

Senator Graham: (15:39)
He didn't want German speaking populations. He wanted the entire world to speak German. He wanted the entire world to fall under his Nazi regime. He was nuts. And it took a bunch of people from all over the world, particularly America, to destroy the Third Reich. And about 60 million people died because we got it wrong in the thirties. Six being Jews. We're not gonna let that happen again. As long as I'm around the presiding officer of President Trump and the people of Israel, we're not gonna let that happen. We're gonna stick with Israel because stick it with them is helping us. They're fighting the people that want to kill us as much as they want to kill all the Jews. Their fight, in my view, is our fight. Operation Midnight Hammer, after day 60, all the negotiations went nowhere 'cause the Iranians didn't want 'em to go anywhere. 

Senator Graham: (16:39)
President Trump acted and it was brilliant. It was bold, and it will live in history to all those who took part in this. God bless you. We have the finest military on earth. We proved that yet again. But you can have the best military if you don't have the right commander in chief. Nothing happens. We got the right commander in chief, married up with the strongest military in history, which will make us safer. We're not looking to take over Iran. We're not looking to invade Iran. We're looking to make sure that the fanatics who run Iran can't hurt us and can't destroy our friends in Israel. And President Trump did something about it. He sent B twos to Guam and everybody thought, well, what's that all about? Well, they missed the other B twos that went to Iran and put a hurting on these three enrichment sites to the pilots, to the air crews, to everybody involved. Well done. I spent 30 something years in the Air Force and I've never been more proud. Fly, fight, win. Now what's next? They shot missiles at our air base and guitar. The Iranians did today about 16 or 19. One may have gotten through, I think they called us, but just remember what I said. They shot missiles at us today. They shot missiles at Israel last night. 

Senator Graham: (18:10)
The strikes a couple of days ago were designed to shut down. The enrichment facilities used to make this weapons. Grade uranium, I think we're a substantially successful. I have never been more proud of President Trump and our military, and I think we set back their nuclear program substantially. But here's what we didn't do. We didn't change their desire for a nuclear weapon. We changed the capability to make one. Here's my goal, is to have people in charge of Iran who don't want a nuclear weapon to destroy Israel, who will not be the largest state sponsor of terrorism, but live in peace with their neighbors and have a good relationship with the United States. That's what I want. And if you don't want that, there's something wrong with how do you get that? Two ways the religious fanatics reject their their agenda, they change their behavior. Maybe that'll happen. 

Senator Graham: (19:12)
I don't know. Or you change the people and you replace the religious fanatics with people in Iran who do not want to destroy the world, who do not want create a master religion, who wanna live in peace. And I think that's the vast majority of the Iranians. If we get this right, stick with Israel, stand up to this bully, this religious fanatical regime, let Israel do what they need to do, then I think peace is coming. The presiding officer and myself went to Saudi Arabia and Israel to talk about Saudi Arabia recognizing the Jewish state under certain conditions. Before the attack of October 7th, we were very close to expanding the Abraham Accords to include a deal between Saudi Arabia and Israel that basically would end the Arab Israeli conflict. An amazing moment in history. October the seventh comes along a vicious, brutal attack on Israel by Hamas, which is fully funded by Iran raping women, killing children in front of the parents and doing things that we really don't need to be talking about on the floor that was designed to stop reconciliation between Saudi Arabia and Israel. 

Senator Graham: (20:32)
Because for the Iranian fanatical regime, the worst nightmare is for the Arab world to make peace with Israel and move toward the light. These people want darkness for the world. So what do we do now? Israel has had it. I talked to the Prime Minister yesterday before I went on television, and I asked him, what would you like me to tell America, Bebe? He said three things. We're profoundly grateful to the American people for what you do to help the Jewish state. We couldn't be here without you. We're profoundly grateful to President Trump for his strong leadership. He also wanted me to urge the people of Iran to seize the moment, to end the nightmare you've been living. And the third thing he wanted me to tell the American people is Israel is not going to live this way anymore. They're not gonna raise their children in bomb shelters. 

Senator Graham: (21:35)
They're not gonna have their life interrupted daily by ballistic missiles coming F from religious Nazis who want to kill all the Jews like Hitler. They're not gonna put up with that. Regime changes coming to Iran one or two ways. The regime renounces what they've been doing since 1979 and change course or it's replaced. To expect Israel to do anything else is offensive to me. You're asking Israel to accept normal being attacked every day and every night by over a 500 ballistic missiles. Over 24 Israeli citizens have been killed. The missiles going into Israel are designed to kill children. The attack by the Israelis are designed to shut down the regime's nuclear capability. But the targets are changing. They're now going after the police force that keeps the I toll in power. The int intelligence services that scare people into submission. The prisons that house dissidents, Israel has made a faithful decision to go to the heart of this regime, to take these religious Nazis down one way or the other, reject Nazism in the form of religion or get new people. 

Senator Graham: (23:04)
And I am with 'em. I'm with 'em. To the bitter end, I'm with 'em. Because being with them is in your own interest. If you're an American, being with them is in your own interest. If you believe in religious tolerance, being with Israel means you reject a regime that would take a 16-year-old girl off the bus and beat her to death because she didn't have a head cover. This is evil. We're fighting. These are as evil. It's a Nazis. 80 years later, we're having a debate about what the Jewish people should do to a group that wants to kill 'em all. Really, we're debating among ourselves, what is too much against a regime trying to build dozens of nuclear weapons to blow people off the planet they don't like or agree with. What kinda world are we living in? 

Senator Graham: (24:05)
To all those who wanna hold Israel back? What would you do if it were our country? Would you hold us back If you tried to, we'd run you over. We're not gonna live this way as Americans. So what is this all about? I'm gonna end where I began. It's about a fanatical regime that took over the country by force that started out imprisoning. Americans been trying to build nuclear bombs, multiple nuclear bombs, has been the largest state sponsor of terrorism since 1984. Has American blood on its hands, has attacked Israel over and over and over again, has suppressed its own people. It's about a religious agenda. Why do they do what they do? Religious fanatical beliefs. 

Senator Graham: (25:07)
A master religion for the world. And if you don't believe that, you have missed a lot. That's what they want. And the only way they're not gonna get there is for somebody to stop 'em. What did Hitler want to take over the entire world and create a master race? Anybody that didn't fit his definition of the right kind of person was imprisoned or killed. The Ito and his henchmen have that same view, but it's religiously driven. So what happens in the next few days is gonna determine the course of history for the state of Israel and the region for decades to come to our friends in Israel. Finish the job. Do what you have to do to bring about the regime change that will allow your children to sleep through the night to the American people. Wake up. Understand what we're fighting. The ayatollah is not normal. 

Senator Graham: (26:10)
These are not normal people. Stand with Israel. Standing with Israel. You're standing by your, you're helping your own self. You're helping your own families. I'll make a prediction. Israel's gonna win, and this regime's gonna fall. This regime's gonna fall of its own way. The people in Iran are gonna have a chance as the regime gets weakened to rise up and take back their own lives. I don't know when that day's coming, but it's coming soon. I believe that. I believe the day of reckoning is here for the religious Nazis running Iran. That their terrorism is coming to end and it's gonna be replaced by a region that moves together where Sunnis and Chi is, and Israelis and all different groups, Christians work together to build economies where all boats rise. We live in a time of choosing. I choose to stand up to evil.

Thank you Madam President. I yield the floor.


Speach Given on the Senate Floor
Tuesday, June 24, 2025