As the Republican Party mourns Sen. Lindsey Graham, it’s also confronted with selecting his replacement. A new species of dinosaur with a neck as long as a school bus is discovered in Thailand. And the World Cup’s stoppage time conundrum.

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GOP mourns Lindsey Graham and begins search for his replacement

As tributes continue pouring in for the late Sen. Lindsey Graham, the Republican Party is scrambling to find his replacement.

Hours after Graham’s death, President Donald Trump said he had a person in mind but declined to share a name. South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster must appoint someone to take over the post until early January, and a special primary election will also be held Aug. 11 for the permanent fill. Some prominent state figures are already indicating they may run.

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Graham’s preliminary cause of death was an aortic rupture due to a hardening of his arteries, his office said yesterday. The condition is rare, can happen without warning and may cause symptoms similar to those of a heart attack.

The lawmaker leaves behind a legacy defined by his foreign policy views and his evolution from a fiery critic of Trump to one of his staunchest supporters.

Over nearly 32 years in Congress, he built a career as a vocal war hawk who supported the U.S. campaigns in Afghanistan, Iraq and Iran. He was one of Ukraine’s most steadfast advocates in Washington and had pressed for stronger sanctions on Russian oil in the days before his death.

Graham was initially a harsh critic of Trump, in 2015 calling him “a race-baiting, xenophobic, religious bigot.” He went on to become a vocal cheerleader for the president, helping him remake the Supreme Court as chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Read more about the late senator’s legacy here.

More politics news:

• Mitch McConnell said in his first public statement since he was hospitalized nearly a month ago that he was “briefly unconscious” after a fall and had mild pneumonia. He added that he would return to the Senate but didn’t give a date.

• Republicans feel increasingly upbeat about their chances in the midterms, with GOP strategists telling NBC News they are less worried than they were a few months ago about the Iran war and rising prices hurting their party.

• Trump administration officials are ramping up efforts to sow doubt about midterm election results.

• The U.S. and Iran gave conflicting information about whether the Strait of Hormuz is open as strikes escalated over the weekend.

Staff Pick: The first state to enforce Trump’s Medicaid changes is off to a chaotic start

In Nebraska, Medicaid participants say they’re spending over an hour on hold to ask if they’re about to lose their health coverage. Some are driving to state offices to try to get answers in person. One healthcare advocate described the situation as “extreme mass confusion.”

And this may be the calm before the storm.

Starting on Aug. 1, Nebraska will begin kicking people off Medicaid if they don’t comply with the Trump administration’s new work requirements or show that they qualify for an exemption.

Many Nebraskans fear they could get dropped — even if they should still be receiving benefits. I spoke with a mother of three who works more than the required 80 hours a month but is unsure how to track and submit hours from her part-time gigs. I spoke with another woman whose health issues make it difficult to stand or use a computer. She submitted a doctor’s note but is still waiting to hear whether she can get a medical exemption.

What’s happening in Nebraska is a test case for the rest of the country, with dozens more states implementing the work requirements by Jan. 1.

— Elizabeth Chuck, national reporter

Actor Sam Neill, who starred as Dr. Alan Grant in ‘Jurassic Park,’ dies at 78

Sam Neill, the New Zealand actor best known for his portrayal of Dr. Alan Grant in the “Jurassic Park” movies, has died, a family statement said. He was 78.

“The loss was sudden and unexpected but blessed by the fact that Sam remained cancer free,” the statement read. Neill had announced he was cancer free in April after five years undergoing treatment for blood cancer.

New Zealand Prime Minister Christopher Luxon praised Neill’s impact on films in New Zealand and abroad, calling him “one of the greats.”

“For more than fifty years he took New Zealand stories to the world and his talents helped make our film industry into what it is today — one of our greatest cultural exports,” he said on X.

Neill played a Soviet submarine officer in the 1990 film “The Hunt for Red October” and the husband of Holly Hunter’s Ada in the Oscar-winning historical romance “The Piano” in 1993. Other notable roles include a haunted astrophysicist in the 1997 sci-fi horror film “Event Horizon” and a middle-aged Merlin, the wizard from the tales of King Arthur, in the 1998 NBC miniseries of the same name.

The latter role earned him one of two Emmy nominations and three Golden Globe nominations.

In the 2010s, Neill maintained his presence in TV and film with roles in the British crime drama series “Peaky Blinders,” among others.

Read the full story here.

Confused when World Cup stoppage time ends? You’re not alone

If it feels like World Cup matches are never ending, you’re not going crazy.

It’s a frequent occurrence: Additional minutes are added at the end of each half to account for stoppages in play, but even after that time is up, the referee still won’t blow the whistle. The delay has mystified many fans, even leading one group to study it.

In 2022, a team of economics researchers set out to discover whether added time was applied equally to both halves of World Cup matches. They found that referees added more time in the second — but it didn’t always make sense why.

“You could have identical stoppages in the first half and the second half, and there’s two minutes more added time that is unexplainable,” said Robert Butler, a senior economics lecturer at Ireland’s University College Cork.

And even more time was added when matches were close in the second half, which benefited trailing teams in the final minutes.

Here’s what else they found.

🗓 What to watch: Matches resume tomorrow, when France and Spain play in the semifinal round at 3 p.m. Eastern. See the full schedule.

📩 Join the excitement: Sign up for The Sports Desk newsletter for more in-depth World Cup coverage.

New long-necked dinosaur from 130 million years ago uncovered in Thailand

A new study has identified a previously unknown dinosaur whose neck stretched the length of a school bus. The plant-eating giant, named Uragasaurus kalasinensis, is believed to have roamed what is now northeast Thailand around 130 million years ago.

The dinosaur belonged to the Mamenchisauridae family of enormous, four-legged herbivores known as sauropods, famous for long necks that helped them reach vegetation.

Researchers from Thailand’s Mahasarakham University created digital models of the fossils using CT scanning and 3D reconstruction techniques, allowing them to examine the internal and external structures of the bones in detail.

By identifying a unique combination of features that did not match any known species, they concluded the remains represented a new mamenchisaurid dinosaur.

Read the full story here.

Read All About It

• A charging bison threw a 65-year-old man into the air at Yellowstone National Park, leading to his hospitalization.

• A major international trial found healthy behaviors can improve brain health in older adults at risk of dementia.

• An NFL employee is suing New York City over a shooting in a midtown Manhattan building last year that killed four people and left him with “physical and psychological injuries.”

• A U.S. citizen working for a humanitarian organization in Congo has tested positive for the Ebola virus, the CDC said.

NBC Selected: Online Shopping, Simplified

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