Jen Psaki, a CNN political commentator, was the White House communications director and State Department spokeswoman during the Obama administration. She is vice president of communications and strategy at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Follow her at @jrpsaki. The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of the author. Read more opinion articles at CNN.

(CNN) For those waiting for a profile in courage to emerge from Republicans in Congress after President Donald Trump was implicated by his former personal lawyer Michael Cohen, who pleaded guilty to eight criminal counts, stop holding your breath. Sen. Lindsey Graham, formerly one of Trump's harshest critics, just paved the way for the post-midterm election fate of Attorney General Jeff Sessions, telling reporters on Capitol Hill that Trump is "entitled to an attorney general he has faith in."

President Trump has not hidden his exasperation with Sessions, or his reason for being exasperated: Sessions' decision to recuse himself from oversight of Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation.

Graham made these comments on the same day President Trump gave an interview to Ainsley Earhardt from Fox News with the sole purpose of once again obliterating Sessions, even attacking his commitment and his manhood: "He took the job and then he said, 'I'm going to recuse myself.' I said, 'What kind of a man is this?'"

He then went on to reiterate his long-standing view that he made a mistake in putting Sessions in the job. "Even my enemies say that Jeff Sessions should have told you that he was going to recuse himself and then you wouldn't have put him in," he said.

So why do Graham's comments matter?

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