Lindsey Graham called Trump a “race-baiting xenophobic bigot” in 2015. In fact, he said in full,

I think what you like about him, he appears to be strong and the rest of us are weak. He’s a very successful businessman and he’s gonna make everything great. He’s gonna take all the problems of the world and put ’em in a box and make your life better. That’s what he’s selling.

Here’s what you’re buying: He’s a race-baiting, xenophobic religious bigot. He doesn’t represent my party. He doesn’t represent the values that the men and women who wear the uniform are fighting for.

and yet Trump went on to win the nomination. Bobby Jindal called Trump a “narcissist” and an “egomaniacal madman” but went on to support him “warts and all.”

If Graham (and others in the GOP who criticized Trump at that time) had truly meant those words then his victory should have given the leaders in the GOP pause, for it meant one of several things, none of them good:

1. They assume their constituents are too stupid to see this.
2. These men were not as worried about Trump’s real flaws as they were about the perceived threat of Clinton, which suggests they have no unbending principles.
3. These men understood perfectly what was said and agreed with Trump’s race-baiting and xenophobia.