GOP senators congratulated Kamala Harris on becoming vice president-elect on the Senate floor while continuing to deny Biden's win in public

• Several Republican senators congratulated Vice President-elect Kamala Harris on her victory as President-elect Joe Biden's running mate in private remarks on the Senate floor on Tuesday.
• CNN's Manu Raju reported that Sens. Tim Scott, James Lankford, Mike Rounds, and Ben Sasse all approached Harris to congratulate her. Only Sasse has publicly acknowledged Biden and Harris' electoral win.
• Sen. Lindsey Graham, one of the most prominent defenders of President Donald Trump's bogus voter-fraud claims, was also filmed giving Harris a fist bump.
• While most GOP lawmakers have publicly refused to acknowledge Biden's victory, many have privately accepted Biden to be the 46th president of the United States.

Several Republican senators have congratulated Vice President-elect Kamala Harris on her victory as Joe Biden's running mate even while publicly echoing President Donald Trump's refusal to acknowledge the Democrats' presidential victory.

According to the CNN congressional correspondent Manu Raju, Sens. Tim Scott of South Carolina, James Lankford of Oklahoma, Mike Rounds of South Dakota, and Ben Sasse of Nebraska all approached Harris to congratulate her on the Senate floor on Tuesday.

Of those four senators, only Sasse has publicly acknowledged Biden's election win. Raju later told CNN's Anderson Cooper that when he asked Lankford about his remarks to Harris, the senator said that he was simply being polite and that the gesture didn't mean he was conceding Biden's victory.

—Manu Raju (@mkraju) November 17, 2020

—Manu Raju (@mkraju) November 17, 2020

Footage also showed Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina approaching Harris to give her a fist bump.

—The Recount (@therecount) November 17, 2020

Graham has been one of the most vocal defenders of Trump's baseless claims questioning the integrity of the election.

Earlier this week Georgia's top election official said Graham had tried to get him to throw out thousands of ballots in several counties. Biden was ultimately projected the winner of the state.

Raju told Cooper on Tuesday that when he asked Graham about the fist bump, the senator suggested he would be willing to work with Harris when Biden's victory was ratified by the Electoral College in the coming weeks.

Tuesday was Harris' first return to the Senate since her and Biden's presidential victory. She had attended to vote against Trump's selection of Judy Shelton to join the Federal Reserve Board of Governors.

There have been signs in recent days that the wall of Republican senators who have stood by Trump's refusal to acknowledge Biden's victory is beginning to crack.

On Monday, Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida referred to Biden as the president-elect, more than a week after most news organizations projected Biden as the winner of the election.

Sens. Mitt Romney of Utah, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, and Susan Collins of Maine have also acknowledged Biden's win.

In private, many Trump allies have conceded that the president's prospects of victory in the slew of lawsuits he has launched to challenge vote counts in swing states are remote and that Biden will take office in January.