Politics

The GOP race for SC governor heats up without Trump’s endorsement — for now

Published

8 months ago

October 31, 2025

One Republican candidate in South Carolina’s open gubernatorial primary said Donald Trump would “decide my fate.” Another pledged to send the state’s National Guard troops wherever Trump wants. A third accompanied the then-presidential candidate to his 2024 criminal trial in Manhattan.

In recent interviews with Blue Light News, three contenders for the seat being vacated by Gov. Henry McMaster gushed over Trump’s coveted endorsement and described some of their early efforts to secure it as the president plans to attend a fundraiser in the state for the reelection of his longtime ally, Sen. Lindsey Graham.

The winner of next June’s Republican primary is all but guaranteed to become deep-red South Carolina’s next executive. The candidates include the state’s lieutenant governor, attorney general and two members of its congressional delegation — all of whom are thirsting for the president’s support.

A new Winthrop University poll — the first major independent survey of the primary — found Rep. Nancy Mace and Lt. Gov. Pam Evette led the field in a statistical tie at 17 percent and 16 percent, respectively. Rep. Ralph Norman and Attorney General Alan Wilson followed with 8 percent each.

Though early favorites have started to emerge, the race remains wide open without Trump’s nod.

“He’ll get to decide my fate. He is a kingmaker, and I hope in this case he will be a queenmaker,” said Mace, the third-term member of Congress known for being outspoken on conservative cable news and social media.

South Carolina has a long history of fierce loyalty to Trump. McMaster became the first statewide elected official to endorse the president’s nascent 2016 campaign, and Graham is one of his closest advisers on Capitol Hill and friends on the putting green. Democrats haven’t won the state in a presidential election since Jimmy Carter defeated Gerald Ford in 1976.

But so far, Trump has stayed out of the race, forcing the contenders to try to define themselves and their candidacies without input from someone who has dominated the party for a decade and remade it in his image. In that way, the race — taking place during a pivotal midterm cycle — mirrors the challenge awaiting the Republican Party, which must begin to grapple with a future without Trump, who is in his final term.

For now, the candidates aren’t willing to explore that future.

“Donald Trump is the gold standard. He casts a very long shadow over state politics here in South Carolina, especially in the Republican primary,” said Wilson. “Anyone who says they don’t want the president’s endorsement is crazy.”

From his perch in Columbia, Wilson has filed nearly 20 briefs across the federal judiciary in support of Trump administration initiatives like federalizing the National Guard or enforcing the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, according to a Blue Light News analysis. His campaign website features a “Trump Tough” section, which includes a slideshow of selfies and step-and-repeat pictures with the president.

Trump’s only attention to the race so far was a captionless post on Truth Social in mid-August showing the results of a survey that put Mace atop of the crowded field — a poll that the congresswoman shared with the president, according to campaign spokesperson Piper Gifford.

“I absolutely communicate with the White House on this race and provide data and information to them and to those who will be ultimately making the decision,” Mace said in the recent interview.

Wilson has also been in touch with “high level members” of the White House about his candidacy, but has yet to broach the race directly with Trump. “They are aware of my campaign. They are aware of what I have done as attorney general. They are aware that I have defended the president’s agenda, that I have defended the president,” he said.

Evette entered the race in mid-July. Though she served two terms alongside McMaster, her foray into gubernatorial contention will be her first time running for elected office on her own ticket. Asked about any behind-the-scenes conversations with the White House seeking support, the state’s second-in-command demurred, while reiterating her loyalty to Trump at his political nadir.

“In January of ‘23, President Trump came to South Carolina, and he was looking for friends,” Evette said, recalling Trump’s brief time in the political wilderness following his 2020 loss and the Jan. 6 Capitol riot. “Out of all the people that are in this race, I was the only one that showed up for him, stood shoulder to shoulder with him when there were no polls to say that he was going to win.”

She recalled national consultants warning her, “‘You have a bright future, you’re killing yourself. Like, why are you doing this? He’s going to get indicted.’ And I was like, well, loyalty matters.”

Loyalty to Trump might determine his endorsement, and the candidates are willing to leverage that litmus test against one another.

Unlike Evette, Mace publicly rebuked the president following the attack on the Capitol but has since returned to his side as a faithful ally on Capitol Hill.

Norman might have the hardest case to make in seeking Trump’s endorsement.

As a member of Congress’ hard-right Freedom Caucus, Norman’s deficit-hawk style has at times positioned him against some White House-backed legislation that the group criticised for expanding the national debt. Perhaps worse for his fate: endorsing South Carolina’s Nikki Haley during the 2024 Republican presidential primary.

“Ralph Norman has the best record of voting with Trump of any candidate and is proud to work with him in Congress. He’d welcome the President’s endorsement but knows that the President has other friends in this race and he respects that,” Norman spokesperson Evan Newman said in a statement.

Speaking with reporters after a party fundraising event in Columbia earlier this summer, Graham said he told the president to “wait and see” before issuing an endorsement in the governor’s race. South Carolina is at least somewhat on the president’s mind, though. The president will take his first in-person dip into the 2026 midterms when he attends a fundraiser that in part is billed to Graham’s own reelection campaign, Blue Light News first reported.

The White House did not respond to a request for comment on the president’s conversations around a possible endorsement or whether he is communicating with any of the candidates. The lack of endorsement in South Carolina isn’t indicative of a larger trend, though. The president has already thrown his support behind Rep. Byron Donalds to succeed Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis next year, and his former rival-turned-ally Vivek Ramaswamy got the coveted endorsement not long after his campaign launch in February.

Lacking a race-changing boost from the president, the candidates have touted their own fundraising as evidence of grassroots support and the campaign strength. By those metrics, no runaway favorite has yet to emerge.

The four contenders each reported raising over a million dollars since starting their campaigns, according to financial reports filed with the South Carolina Elections Commission. Evette and Norman led the pack with $1.4 and $1.3 million respectively, though both also gave their own campaigns six-figure sums.

Wilson, who launched his campaign first, has just under $1.3 million. According to a memo released by his campaign, about one-fifth of that haul includes a six-figure transfer from his state attorney general campaign account, with “still more transfers on the way.”

“They believed in him to be Attorney General and now want him to be Governor,” campaign finance chair Barry Wynn wrote.

Mace’s fundraising shows her slightly trailing her competitors, with $1.06 million raised, but other indicators bode well for her campaign. In addition to the new Winthrop poll showing her with a slight lead, she pulled in over 18,500 individual donations, exponentially more than her rivals.

In addition to the candidates’ agreement on the eminence of a presidential endorsement, the emerging issues separating them are decidedly local.

They’re aligned on the perennial sticking points that are likely to define the race: lowering taxes, and specifically eliminating the state’s income tax, and fixing the state’s aging infrastructure as it buckles under population growth.

Judicial reform has also emerged as a salient issue, with South Carolina and Virginia being the only states in the country where judges are selected by a commission and approved solely by a legislative vote. Neither the governor nor voters have a say in who serves on the local bench.

“Many of these folks have cases before these judges and then many of these attorneys fund the attorney generals and the solicitors when they’re running for office. Everybody gets paid, and nobody goes to jail,” Mace said.

The candidates don’t seem to agree on how to implement this one: as the state’s top prosecutor, Wilson helped push some recent changes through the state legislature that allowed the governor to appoint one-third of the seats on a selection committee that took effect this year.

“I believe that the governor should have all of the appointments on the [Judicial Merit Selection Committee],” Wilson said, while expressing openness to pushing a constitutional amendment that would embrace the federal advise-and-consent model.

Evette, banking on the relationship she forged with the state legislature alongside McMaster, hopes to move directly to amending the state constitution to have the state mirror federal judicial appointments.

Norman is the only candidate to call for direct election of judges in the state.

McMaster, who has focused on business development in the relatively small state, is preparing to leave his two terms in Columbia with a 46-percent approval rating, matching Trump at the top of the public figures included in the Winthrop University survey.

McMaster has so far demurred on whether he’ll endorse any of his potential successors.

Speaking to reporters recently, he said, “Elections will come and go, and endorsements will be made whenever they’re made.”

Politics

Alaska Supreme Court says man with same name as Sen. Dan Sullivan can be on primary ballot

Published

5 minutes ago

June 30, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Jun. 30, 2026, 5:12 AM EDT

JUNEAU, Alaska (AP) — The Alaska Supreme Court ruled Monday that a man with the same nameand party affiliation as Alaska Republican U.S. Sen. Dan Sullivan is qualified to run for the seat and ordered elections officials to place him on the August primary ballot.

The ruling came hours after the court heard arguments and just days after state court Judge Thomas Matthews found the Division of Elections had “abused its discretion”in booting the challenger Sullivan from the ballot. The Supreme Court, in a brief ruling, affirmed Matthews’ decision to include the challenger on the ballot but sent back to the division the issue of how he should be listed as a candidate “within the confines of existing Alaska ballot design law.”

The court said a full opinion explaining its decision would be released later.

Jeffrey Robinson, an attorney for the challenger Sullivan, expressed gratitude for the ruling and said he expected the division “will act in full compliance” with ballot design law in preparing the ballots. Sam Curtis, a spokesperson for the state Department of Law, said the state appreciated the quick ruling “and will work to implement the order.”

Nate Adams, a spokesperson for Sen. Sullivan’s campaign, said while disappointed by the ruling, the campaign is encouraged that Beecher “will be able to use her expertise to differentiate between the Petersburg fraud and the incumbent — Senator Dan Sullivan — to the benefit of Alaska voters.”

Division of Elections Director Carol Beecher issued a decision June 15 finding the challenger’s candidacy was not filed in good faith and instead was done with an intent to confuse voters. But Matthews said Beecher’s decision was not based on the requirements set out by the U.S. Constitution to serve in the Senate — which address age, citizenship and residency — or on state laws or regulations.

Alaska’s US Senate race could help determine control of chamber

The dust-up over the two Dan Sullivans began with the challenger filing his candidacy about a month ago and has roiled one of the most closely watched Senate races in the country. Alaska’s race is one of about a half dozen Senate contests that are considered competitive and could determine control of the chamber for President Donald Trump’s final two years in office.

The candidate filing prompted accusations by the senator and his alliesincluding the National Republican Senatorial Committee, that the challenger is a sham candidate intent on sowing chaos. Republican Lt. Gov. Nancy Dahlstrom, who oversees elections, responded by announcing an investigation into the challenger’s candidacy.

Two complaints raising questions about his party affiliation and motives were filed by the Alaska Republican Party chair.

The senator also accused the challenger Sullivan of working with Democrats and the campaign of Democratic former U.S. Rep. Mary Peltola to cause confusion. Peltola’s campaign and state Democrats have denied the allegation, as has the challenger, who said the decision to run was “my choice.”

Peltola is seen as the senator’s main rival in the race, which features more than a dozen candidates.

The top four vote-getters in the primary, regardless of party affiliation, advance to a ranked choice general election in November.

The challenger Sullivan, 69, a retired teacher from the small fishing community of Petersburg, told The Associated Press on Monday he had grown frustrated with the incumbent and thought the timing for a run was right. “I just decided it was something I needed to do,” he said. “I will find out if it was the right thing or not, but I’m going to give it a shot.”

He said he aims to pull votes from the senator, as any challenger would. “But no, I’m not trying to trick people,” he told the AP.

Arguments before the state Supreme Court

Attorneys for the challenger Sullivanin filings before the state Supreme Court, said the elections division disqualified their client “because of what it thought were his reasons for running.” They called the good-faith standard applied by Beecher “legally unsupportable.”

Matthews agreed in his decision Friday to allow Sullivan on the ballot, saying, the elections division determination “was based upon a new, previously unstated, ‘good-faith’ criteria.”

Beecher, in disqualifying the challenger Sullivan, said he had registered to vote as Daniel J. Sullivan Jr. and in conjunction with his candidacy changed his party affiliation to Republican, an affiliation he did not previously had. She cited similarities between his campaign website and the senator’s, and his work with a consultant whose clients have included some Democrats. She did not mention finding any evidence of coordination.

Attorneys general from 14 Republican-led states submitted a brief supporting the division and asking the state Supreme Court to keep the challenger Sullivan off the ballot.

The division initially certified both Sullivans as candidates, identifying the challenger as Dan J. Sullivan and the incumbent as Dan S. Sullivan.

Debate over ballot design

Attorneys representing the state, in their filings, said using a middle initial on the ballot would not be enough to help voters distinguish between the two Sullivans. They asked the court to uphold Beecher’s finding.

But if the court ordered the challenger Sullivan on the ballot, they proposed he be listed as Daniel James Sullivan Jr. with a nonpartisan party affiliation — arguing the division believed it could deny him being labeled a Republican since he had no prior affiliation with that party before running. The attorneys, led by outside counsel Christopher Murray, proposed in their brief that the senator be listed as Dan Sullivan, registered Republican and incumbent.

Attorneys for the challenger said any proposal to list their client as “nonpartisan” would be unlawful because Alaska law allows him to be listed according to his party preference. It proposed he be listed on the ballot as Dan J. Sullivan, a Republican.

They said the senator could ensure his supporters are aware of his middle initial and that the state’s candidate information pamphlet, which is sent to voters, also could help address any confusion.

At least one outside group supporting the senator has been running ads and sending political mailers referring to him as Sen. Dan S. Sullivan.

Politics

RFK Jr. says Cassidy accusing him of breaking promises ‘not true’

Published

2 hours ago

June 30, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

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Key panel advances Johnson’s plan to merge SAVE America Act with NDAA

Published

2 hours ago

June 30, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

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