Lindsey Graham says he’ll pull out of climate bill negotiations in Dems' sudden move to put immigration reform first

UPDATE 6:30 p.m CDT: Kerry has cancelled the Monday press conference, The Hill's E2Wire reports.

It looks like Lindsey Graham is going to rain on John Kerry’s parade

Sen. Graham (R-S.C.) said, in a letter obtained Saturday by CNN, that he is no longer negotiating on the climate bill and won’t appear at a news conference planned for Monday to unveil it. In dropping out, Graham takes the “bi-partisan” out of the so-called bi-partisan comprehensive climate bill, leaving Sen. Kerry (D-Mass.) and Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) holding the bag.

A particularly cruel blow after they managed to get two or three major oil companies, GE, the Christian Coalition and other leaders to stand with them Monday in support of the bill.

Graham wrote to business and other leaders he’s been negotiating with that he is withdrawing because it appears immigration reform will now get first dibs on the Senate floor. Graham called it a “panicked … political ploy” by the Democrats, who are reacting to threats by Latinos to stay away from the polls in November. He says between that and the Supreme Court nomination, it’s hardly likely climate will be on the agenda before year’s end.

It’s easy to see how he would be peeved. The trio working on the bill has toiled long and hard to make it palatable to enough Senators to get 60 votes. But politics being what they are, I suspect there are a few other reasons he may be backing out:

• They simply don’t have the votes they need for the climate bill. Other Republicans aren’t coming forward and Graham doesn’t want to be hanging out there alone. He has already caught hell from constituents for even working with the enemy on climate – not to mention some blogger who said he’s gay and Dems are blackmailing him to get his support.

• He’s hoping his threat to back out will make Dem leadership put climate first because, as a good Republican, he’d like to see immigration reform delayed until after Election Day.

• He’s trying to protect his buddy Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) from having to deal with immigration as he tries to veer to the right before a tough primary, as some Democrats suggested to CNN.

Kerry, Graham and Lieberman met with Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) Thursday to talk about the timing of climate vs. immigration. Reid reportedly was non-committal but said he planned to bring both to the floor before August. As I noted in an earlier post, Reid is running behind in Nevada and definitely needs Latino votes if he is to have a chance at re-election.

Graham has also been working on the immigration issue, but said that bill is far from written.

(Sources: CNN , E&E News PM)