The Senate Ethics Committee issued a public letter Thursday admonishing Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., for soliciting campaign contributions last year while at the U.S. Capitol complex.

The incident happened during a Nov. 30 interview with Fox News. Speaking from the rotunda of the Russell Senate Office Building, Graham urged viewers five times in a nine-minute interview to donate money to Herschel Walker, a candidate in Georgia’s U.S. Senate runoff.

“Go to TeamHerschel.com,” Graham said in the interview. “If you can give five or ten bucks, it will help him close the gap.”

Senate ethics rules prohibit elected officials from using federal buildings or taxpayer-funded resources for campaign activity.

“The Committee finds that your conduct was contrary to Senate standards of conduct and, accordingly, issues you this Public Letter of Admonition,” committee Chairman Chris Coons, D-Del., and Vice Chairman James Lankford, R-Okla., wrote to Graham.

It was not Graham’s first such violation. He also solicited campaign contributions in an unplanned October 2020 interview conducted in the Dirksen Senate Office Building, the letter noted.  In that incident, the Ethics Committee dismissed the complaint after determining Graham’s conduct was “inadvertent, technical” and trivial in nature.

“Applying this standard to your conduct, the Committee finds that you did solicit federal campaign contributions and otherwise impermissibly conducted campaign activity in a federal building,” Thursday’s letter said. “Further, you made these campaign solicitations despite the Committee's specific guidance following your violation in October 2020.

“The public must feel confident that Members use public resources only for official actions in the best interests of the United States, not for partisan political activity. Your actions failed to uphold that standard, resulting in harm to the public trust and confidence in the United States Senate.”

In a statement to Spectrum News on Friday morning, Graham said: “It was a mistake. I take responsibility. I will try to do better in the future.”

Graham self-reported the November 2022 incident, but it was also quickly criticized by Democratic National Committee Chairman Jaime Harrison, who ran against Graham in 2020.

“Soliciting campaign contributions in a government office building is an ethics violation. He did this when he ran against me… guess he believes ethics rules don’t apply to him!” Harrison tweeted, tagging Coons and Lankford.