Politics

South Carolina’s Senate race tests Trump — again

Published

1 month ago

August 9, 2026

South Carolina Republicans might be watching history repeat itself.

A special election Senate primary on Tuesday, triggered by Sen. Lindsey Graham’s sudden death, has all the makings of their rollercoaster governor’s primary back in June: A front-runner endorsed by President Donald Trump but facing a steep uphill battle to consolidate the field behind her. And the looming threat of a runoff election that could lead to a late surge from another Republican.

Darline Graham is running for a full term to replace her late brother, leading in some public polls over GOP Reps. Russell Fry and Ralph Norman, former Gov. Mark Sanford and businessman Mark Lynch.

The crowded field makes it very unlikely she or anyone else will clinch the majority needed to avoid a bitter runoff. And, aside from deploying his standard playbook of a few Truth Social posts supporting Graham and a last-minute tele-rally scheduled for Monday, Trump has made no public indication of what else he is planning to do to help.

For one particular South Carolina Republican, the situation is all too familiar: Lt. Gov. Pamela Evette had Trump’s backing in the GOP governor’s primary — and then lost to Alan Wilson in the runoff after he rose in the polls and secured a rare double endorsement from the president.

Asked if she wished Trump would have done more to boost her, Evette told Blue Light News: “Obviously, yes. I do wish that, but you know, it didn’t happen that way.” She said she has not yet decided who to endorse in the Senate primary and is keeping a close eye on how it plays out.

“Run it back,” said one national GOP operative, granted anonymity to speak openly about how the South Carolina Senate primary may turn into a redux of the governor’s race. “The long and short of it, [Graham’s] got a pretty low ceiling.”

The snap Senate election tees up another test of Trump’s influence over the Republican Party. It will reveal whether the president’s word alone is enough to carry his preferred candidate to the nomination, and the lengths to which he is willing to go to boost his picks — especially ones who find themselves with an uncertain path to victory.

This will be Graham’s first ever contest at the ballot box in a state known for its bruising GOP political battles. Nearly half a dozen local Republican officials and strategists alike believe Graham is in a strong position to win the first round of voting. But whoever secures the second place spot will determine just how much more support she may need from Trump to overcome a one-on-one challenge.

The White House didn’t respond to a request for comment.

Republicans differed on whether Norman or Fry would pose the bigger challenge to Graham’s path to victory in a runoff scenario. Norman boasts a longtime base of conservative support in the state, while Fry, who was elected to Congress in 2022, is seen as an up-and-coming star who has caught Trump’s interest.

“If it’s Darline and Russell, it definitely has some flavors of the governor’s race,” said Tyson Grinstead, an RNC committee member and chair of the Richland County GOP, who is staying neutral in the Senate race. Both candidates have good relationships with the president — and Trump has already proven he’s willing to double endorse in a runoff.

However, Grinstead added, there are some key differences.

The main flaw in Evette’s strategy that Republicans in South Carolina have pointed to was her decision to run too intensely on her ties to the president in lieu of a more issues-first message.

“I think most of the criticism came because I got his endorsement, and everybody was fighting for his endorsement. That’s how I looked at it,” Evette said in an interview, deflecting the criticism. “In states like this that have these runoffs, where very few people come out, I think if you’re not tied into the establishment, I think it hurts you in some form of fashion.”

With the president’s endorsement already secured, Graham is making a clear effort to differentiate herself not only from her field of contenders, but from her brother as well.

In an interview with Fox News announcing her run, Graham made a point to emphasize her intention to focus on domestic issues in contrast to the late senator’s foreign policy-hued legacy. And she brought the same focus to her first debate stage appearance last week.

“If anybody understands the struggles of South Carolinians, it’s me,” Graham said on stage last week, talking about her own cost of living struggles — even as she vowed to support Trump’s pet projects while in office, including the SAVE America Act.

“Of course the campaign’s advertising highlights the Trump endorsement. We’re proud of it, and there’s no question it’s still the gold standard in Republican politics,” said a person familiar with Graham’s approach, granted anonymity to discuss internal campaign strategy.

“But Darline knows an endorsement opens a door, it doesn’t walk through it for you,” this person added. “She’s out there every day earning this on her own, because that’s what voters deserve — a candidate who shows up and makes her own case, not one who assumes the race is already won.”

One of Graham’s key advantages in staving off a late upset lies in her inherited slate of seasoned operatives and statewide campaign infrastructure — a hallmark of Lindsey Graham’s decades of success in the state.

“Lindsey’s team has been the best team in South Carolina,” said Grinstead, who worked for the late senator’s campaigns in past cycles. “They’re organized, they have a grassroots presence, they have field staff.”

Still, Graham is likely to face a competitive runoff regardless of which candidate squeaks into second place. Fry and Norman are seen as the two most likely contenders based on limited public polling available in the race so far. In a glimpse of how fluid and unpredictable the primary has become, a straw poll conducted by the South Carolina Republican Party showed Graham in third place, trailing both Norman and Fry.

The two representatives offer competing flavors for Republicans to choose from.

Fry is seen in both Washington and Columbia as a rising star in the party. He also has a fan in Trump who, in the muddied political waters immediately following Lindsey Graham’s death, said in an interview with Newsmax that the House Republican is “outstanding” and a “very talented person.”

But questions remain about the legal process of what happens to his congressional seat should he win his party’s nomination for Senate and go on to win in the general election. The state party has signaled they would act quickly to address a vacancy to protect House Republicans’ extremely narrow majority in Congress.

Norman, for his part, already gave up his House seat to run for governor earlier this year. He is a longtime fixture of the state’s most conservative factions, who has at times been a thorn in Trump’s side, like when he endorsed former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley for president in 2024.

But he’s seen as the standard bearer for the powerful Freedom Caucus’ ultraconservative politics in the state, and his gubernatorial bid has left him with a statewide operation that he can reactivate in his run for Senate.

Graham, Fry, and Norman all declined to comment.

Both of Graham’s likely top opponents have honed most of their fire on each other — one of the clearest signs that the first round of the primary is shaping up to be a battle for second place. Still, Graham’s allies have lobbed their own attacks against Fry.

Security in Strength, a PAC that once supported Lindsey Graham’s 2024 reelection, is up on TV with an ad that shows an AI-depiction of Fry’s likeness transposed onto a slice of meat in a frying pan, dumped out by Trump with the words “REJECTED” splashed across the screen.

Fry has recently started taking aim at Graham, launching an ad claiming that she “ballooned the size” and doubled the spending of a government agency — but did not specify which. Graham has worked for the South Carolina Vocational Rehabilitation Department and has led the Commission for the Blind since 2019.

“If Russell Fry wants to attack Senator Darline for helping people with disabilities find jobs and live independently, that’s a bold fight to pick,” Abby Zilch, a Graham spokesperson, said in response in a post on social media.

Politics

The art of dealing with Trump

Published

10 minutes ago

September 21, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Mayor Zohran Mamdani will meet with President Donald Trump at Gracie Mansion this afternoon.

ALL EYES ON GRACIE: Mayor Zohran Mamdani is expected to sit down with President Donald Trump at Gracie Mansion this afternoon, their third in-person meeting in less than a year and the latest wrinkle in one of the strangest relationships in American politics.

Since Mamdani’s first, shockingly cordial meeting with Trump at the White House last November, political observers have scratched their heads about the democratic socialist mayor playing nice with the Republican president despite their deep disagreements on … just about everything. Ostensibly, Mamdani is putting his personal distaste for Trump aside and betting it’s best for New York City to keep things cordial so as to avoid drawing the president’s ire.

But as resistance to Trump remains animating for Democrats nationally ahead of November’s midterms, Mamdani’s strategy for engaging with him stands out.

Earlier today, Gov. Kathy Hochul made clear that she, for one, has no plans to meet with Trump while he’s in New York. “I speak to him on the phone whenever I need to,” she told reporters in Manhattan.

Hochul, who’s facing reelection in November and tends to directly criticize Trump more frequently than Mamdani, said it was her understanding that the mayor agreed to host the president at Gracie Mansion during a previous conversation at the White House.

“The mayor and [Trump] said that when he’s back in town again, he would go to Gracie Mansion,” the governor said. “I don’t have a Gracie Mansion to invite him to.”

Still, Hochul said there’s an opportunity for Mamdani to use the Gracie confab to push Trump on releasing federal funding for New York, including for law enforcement, that she said the president’s administration has been withholding.

“We have to continue fighting for what New York needs,” she said.

Mamdani’s office wouldn’t say who requested today’s meeting or share specifics about the expected focus in advance, only saying the mayor will talk to Trump about “issues affecting New York City.” A Mamdani spokesperson said the mayor will elaborate on what was discussed at a post-meeting press conference that Trump isn’t expected to attend.

After the appointment at Gracie, Trump is slated to meet with French President Emmanuel Macron before headlining a couple Republican fundraisers. By contrast, after his Trump tête-à-tête, Mamdani will have dinner with Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, who’s in the city to headline a United Nations Charter event this evening that will also feature pro-Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil, a person familiar with the plans who was granted anonymity to discuss them told Playbook.

The Queens-born Trump is in town ahead of his Tuesday address to the United Nations General Assembly.

Maintaining a relationship with Trump isn’t without risk for Mamdani.

As Trump remains deeply unpopular amid the war in Iran and other controversies, some Democrats are privately questioning why the mayor sees a need to keep interacting with the president. But so far, Mamdani hasn’t faced any significant pushback from his hard-left base over his engagements with Trump, with leaders of the local chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America largely viewing it as the mayor acting in the city’s best interests. — Chris Sommerfeldt and Madison Fernandez

From the Capitol

Governor Kathy Hochul spoke about New York's AI safety laws at a Monday event in Manhattan.

EYES ON AI: Hochul floated requiring safeguards like an artificial intelligence “kill switch” as part of state-level interventions to address the rapidly evolving technology.

During a Monday event in Manhattan rolling out next steps for enacting the RAISE Act, New York’s landmark AI safety law that is set to go into effect in January, the governor said she’ll “look closely at additional ways to build on” the legislation — including AI kill switches “if they’re deemed feasible and in the best interest of our state.”

The governor in recent days has vowed to take additional AI-related actions beyond the RAISE Act, but has not specified what that might look like. Her suggestion of a kill switch comes days after California Gov. Gavin Newsom issued an executive order to explore such a requirement for AI companies’ most-advanced models.

Some in the tech industry have argued implementing one is not technically feasible. Federal legislation to enact a kill switch requirement is currently stalled in Congress.

When asked to expand on the prospect of requiring a kill switch, Hochul said that “all options are on the table,” but wasn’t making a commitment.

“We’re going to do the research and make the decisions that are thoughtful to protect New Yorkers,” she said. “We’ll go as far as we need to to protect people of this state and ultimately this country in the absence of other leadership.”

MORE BLAKEMAN MONEY: Billionaire former casino developer Steve Wynn has donated $1 million to the main super PAC supporting Republican Bruce Blakeman’s gubernatorial bid, records filed with the state Board of Elections this morning show.

The committee, Strong and Safe New York, has now raised $5.3 million since July.

Wynn has been a top donor to national Republican causes for over a decade. His most recent large donations in New York came last year, when he gave $361,000 to the state GOP and $500,000 to a super PAC boosting Andrew Cuomo’s mayoral bid. — Bill Mahoney

FROM THE CAMPAIGN TRAIL

GOP Rep. Mike Lawler picked up an endorsement from his Democratic House colleague, Rep. Jared Golden of Maine.

ENDORSEMENT CORNER: Rep. Jared Golden (D-Maine) endorsed GOP Rep. Mike Lawler in his reelection campaign in suburban New York, Golden wrote in an opinion article published Monday.

Lawler is facing a tough reelection campaign against Democrat Cait Conley in one of the biggest House battlegrounds this November. The lawmakers have previously collaborated to advance the Northeast Lobsterman Protection Act, and are both members of the centrist Problem Solvers Caucus.

Golden, who is not running for reelection, was one of two House Democrats to break with the party and twice vote in favor of the Republican legislative agenda earlier in September.

“Mike Lawler has been a true partner to me and a friend to fishing families he will never represent,” Golden wrote. “I strongly back him, and I hope voters send him back to work. Wherever you live, find the members who pass laws with the other party, and keep them.”

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries called the cross-aisle endorsement a “smoke and mirrors ploy” that “will do nothing to change the outcome of the race.”

“In desperation, [Lawler] is peddling an 11th hour endorsement from a retiring Congressmember who represents an out of town district more than 400 miles away,” Jeffries said in a statement. “Mike Lawler is an unadulterated phony who has never shown bipartisan courage when it matters.”

ON THE AIRWAVES: With fewer than 50 days to go before Election Day, House Democrats’ main super PAC is making its first TV ad buy in support of Conley on Monday.

The House Majority PAC said it is reserving $1.2 million on cable in the Hudson Valley contest. (An additional $1.2 million is going toward fighting Republican Rep. Tom Kean Jr.’s re-election in New Jersey, which is also covered by the New York City media market.) HMP said earlier this year that it didn’t include the high-dollar NYC media market in its initial reservations because it was “prioritiz[ing] markets where rates increase significantly.”

Republicans have been largely outpacing Democrats in NY-17 on the ad spending front, thanks to significant buys from super PACs backed by the president and House leadership. From the beginning of September through Election Day, the GOP has placed $15 million on ads across broadcast, cable, CTV and digital platforms, according to ad tracker AdImpact.

The new HMP spend is the biggest from an outside Democratic group so far, but still leaves a large gap between the parties. Democrats have placed around $3 million on advertising in the period between September and Election Day, with the largest chunk coming from the Conley campaign. — Madison Fernandez

IN OTHER NEWS

IN OTHER NEWS:

— JUDGES CASH IN: Brooklyn Democratic Party leaders have raked in $190,000 in contributions from judges and judicial candidates since 2012, raising some ethical and legal concerns. (New York Post)

— AFFORDABILITY AHEAD: Anthony Shorris, the mayor’s new pick for the president of the New York City Economic Development Corporation, laid out a vision for solving the city’s affordability crisis that goes beyond Mamdani’s vision for five city-owned grocery stores. (The New York Times)

— BUY NOW, PAY LATER: The Mamdani administration is pushing Albany for tougher ‘buy now, pay later’ regulation, as many New Yorkers use the plans to pay for basic essentials, sinking deeper into debt. (amNY)

Missed this morning’s New York Playbook? We forgive you. Read it here.

Politics

Pritzker says he’s lost 80 pounds on GLP-1 since diabetes diagnosis

Published

5 hours ago

September 21, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

CHICAGO — Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker revealed Monday that he was diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes two years ago and began taking a GLP-1 medication, resulting in an 80-pound weight loss that he says has transformed his health and daily life.

The disclosure marks the first time the Democrat has publicly disclosed that he has diabetes, as well as officially acknowledging that he is on GLP-1 medication, which is prescribed both for diabetes treatment and weight loss. The governor told CBS News he started taking the medication after doctors warned that he would likely need insulin for the rest of his life.

Pritzker is viewed as a likely 2028 presidential candidate and has spent two years batting away questions about his visibly slimmer appearance, though he did hint at his weight loss during the Gridiron Club and Foundation’s annual white-tie dinner in Washington, D.C., earlier this year.

“I’m JB Pritzker, governor of the great state of Illinois, and if you’re seeing me in person for the very first time, yes, I’m the guy who put ‘gov’ in ‘Wegovy,’” he told the high-profile crowd.

The 61-year-old governor said he has struggled with his weight since childhood, dating back to when he was a 7-year-old. That’s about the time his father, Donald Pritzker, suffered a fatal heart attack at age 39 while playing tennis.

President Donald Trump has made Pritzker’s weight an issue, often commenting about it in personal attacks. Asked about his weight loss during an interview with Blue Light News in the spring of 2025, Pritzker said, “How about, just for health.”

In Monday’s CBS interview, the governor said he closely monitored his cholesterol, triglycerides and other health markers for years because of his family history. But after becoming governor, he acknowledged the stress of leading the nation’s sixth-largest state contributed to additional weight gain.

Two years ago, that concern became more urgent when doctors diagnosed him with Type 2 diabetes, he told CBS. “My doctor said, ‘Oh no, you’ll never come off of it. You’re going to have to do this the rest of your life, and I recommend that you take a GLP-1,’” Pritzker recalled about being told he’d have to take insulin.

His wife, MK Pritzker, encouraged her husband to proceed on GLP-1. “I want him to be around for a really long time,” she told CBS.

The governor’s office confirmed that as a result of the GLP-1, plus improved diet and exercise, Pritzker “is no longer on insulin and down to levels that indicate no diabetes/prediabetic levels.”

Pritzker said the effects were almost immediate. Within days, he said, he didn’t feel the appetite urges. “It was the strangest feeling.”

The governor also has gained local attention for taking walks along the Lake Michigan walking path in Chicago. Along with adopting the healthy habit, it’s allowed him to talk regularly to constituents.

During Monday’s interview, Pritzker side-stepped questions about whether he was running for president. “I honestly am focused on what’s best for the people of Illinois,” he said.

The governor also talked about being proud of Illinois’ decision to cover GLP-1 medications for people with diabetes, becoming emotional describing a woman who approached him and told him access to the medication had saved her life.

The announcement about his weight comes as Pritzker is taking a more prominent role in the 2026 midterms, chairing a political action committee focused on investing at least $20 million in Democratic House races. The move has added to speculation about a potential presidential bid, where the demands of a national campaign would put his health and stamina in sharper focus.

Politics

Poll: Here’s what really matters for ‘electability’

Published

11 hours ago

September 21, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Voters are perfectly fine supporting candidates who aren’t white men.

But they do show small preferences for candidates who are younger and Christian, according to new results from The POLITICO Poll. And voters were most likely to penalize transgender candidates in hypothetical matchups, though Democrats were more likely to support them than GOP voters were.

The results cast a new light on a simmering, yearslong public conversation within both parties about what it means to be electable and whether putting forward candidates of varying backgrounds is too politically risky in a close election environment. It’s a debate that defined the last open Democratic presidential primary in 2020 and is poised to play a role in 2028 too.

Democrats have largely focused their debates on whether voters would accept a person of color or a woman, particularly after President Donald Trump defeated Hillary Clinton in 2016 and Kamala Harris in 2024 — while losing to Joe Biden in 2020. But the poll results suggest the characteristics voters care most about are different, shaped by frustrations over aging politicians and both new and old culture wars.

“The American people, I believe, think about identity way less than the average political consultant does,” said Mike Nellis, a longtime Democratic digital strategist who advised Harris’ 2020 presidential campaign. “Obviously there are factors in society that make it harder for women and people of color to get elected, but there are plenty of incredibly talented people out there who are capable of getting over the hump on that.”

To test whether demographic characteristics make a candidate more or less electable, Blue Light News’s polling partner, Public First, showed thousands of respondents a series of head-to-head matchups. In each case, respondents were given basic information about the candidate’s demographics, such as their race, age and gender; their career, with titles such as doctor, attorney general or CEO; and a single-sentence description of their political alignment, either as a progressive or moderate Democratic, independent, or moderate or MAGA Republican.

Respondents then picked which candidate they would prefer, and the results overwhelmingly showed voters cared the most about a candidate’s political ideology. But respondents also revealed more subtle patterns in their preferences.

Voters across both parties were more likely to reject older candidates in favor of younger ones. Republicans in particular favored candidates who were described as Christian or regular churchgoers, even when controlling for the candidates’ politics. GOP respondents picked candidates described as regularly attending a church just under 9% more often than candidates who did not have any faith.

That means that even though Republican respondents usually picked the GOP candidate in head-to-head matchups, for example, they were more likely to cross over and support an independent or Democratic candidate when that candidate was described as Christian.

The results on sexual orientation were more complicated: When candidates were described as “gay,” they were picked about 10% less often across all voters. But when the candidate descriptions describe the candidate as a man married to his husband — without a label for sexual orientation — respondents did not pick them less often in a statistically significant manner.

Voters were less likely to pick transgender candidates, with Democratic voters about 5% less likely while GOP voters were 17% less likely, all else held equal.

The age results were a strong signal that voters want a new generation of candidates after the last presidential cycle was driven by concerns about Biden’s age, fueling a slew of intergenerational primary contests this year and leading major Democratic voices to publicly call for a younger candidate for 2028. Trump is now 80, and Republicans have faced their own conversations about aging politicians, as Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) faced serious health challenges earlier this year.

Amanda Litman, co-founder of Run For Something, which recruits candidates under the age of 40, said when the group started its work nearly a decade ago, younger people were often seen as “risky bets” electorally.

“Now I think people are starting to see that that is not true. Voters will judge people one by one,” Litman said. “They’re also really hungry for change and really hungry for someone who didn’t get us into this mess.”

The poll found candidates over the age of 70 were nearly 10% less likely to be picked than candidates under the age of 50, with Democrats slightly more likely than Republicans to disfavor a candidate due to age.

Notably, The Blue Light News Poll didn’t find differences based on a candidate’s race or gender overall, outside of gender identity. That has long been a topic of debate among Democrats thinking about winning the presidency.

When Harris replaced Biden on the top of Democrats’ ticket in 2024, few questioned that she would choose a white man as her running mate. Since her loss, some Democrats have argued that a white male candidate might be the best path forward for the party in 2028.

Harris also wrote in her memoir about the campaign that she thought picking former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg as her running mate would have been “too risky” because he is gay, and that he otherwise would have been her ideal partner.

But Buttigieg, who is contemplating running for president in 2028, recently argued that the country is ready for a gay president, saying he wouldn’t have launched a bid in 2020 otherwise.

“What’s on people’s minds isn’t about you, your identity as a candidate,” he told NBC News last weekend. “It’s about them. It’s about their lives.”