Voters in South Carolina seemed to be choosing a Republican governor and a Democratic senator on Tuesday evening. Only one of the two elections has been announced so far, and that is the one in which the candidate who received support from President Donald Trump was defeated.
According to CBS News, NBC News, and Decision Desk HQ, Democrat Annie Andrews ( Annie Andrews ) defeated Senator Daryn Graham ( Darline Graham ). She is the first Democrat to win a South Carolina Senate election since Fritz Hollings ( Fritz Hollings ) in 1998, while Trump won that state in 2024 by a margin of 18 percentage points.
On the same ballot, Republican Alan Wilson ( Alan Wilson ) was still leading with a narrow margin in the gubernatorial election as of late Tuesday, but as of press time, the results of that election had not yet been announced. Graham was approximately 10 percentage points behind him in terms of vote share. In other places, split voting is not common tonight, but in South Carolina, enough Republicans supported both Wilson for governor and Andrews for senator, ultimately costing Graham his seat.
The first Senate comeback for the Democratic Party that night occurred in North Carolina, where former Governor Roy Cooper ( Roy Cooper ) defeated Republican Michael Watley ( Michael Whatley ) and won the seat vacated by retiring Senator Tom Tillis ( Thom Tillis ), becoming the first Democrat to win a Senate election in that state since 2008.
The candidate that Trump supported from the very beginning
Trump was involved in every step of Lindsey Graham's rise. In July, after Lindsey Graham ( Lindsey Graham ) passed away, Trump lobbied Governor Henry McMaster ( Henry McMaster ) to appoint her, a political newcomer, to complete the remaining term of her office. She initially described this job as an opportunity to carry on her brother's work. A few days later, Trump posted on Truth Social saying “ RUN , DARLINE , RUN !” and promised her “complete and thorough endorsement.” Three days after that, she announced her candidacy on Fox News.
Trump's endorsement helped her get through the primary elections, but only just. She was forced into a runoff against Republican Representative Ralph Norman ( Ralph Norman ) and won by less than a 5-percentage-point margin.
As the competition in the general election intensifies, Trump takes action again. On October 21st, he held a rally for her in Pendleton ( Pendleton ); a week later, he supported her in Lockhart ( Rock Hill ). On the morning of the Lockhart rally, he posted: " Lindsey is watching , and very proud of her !!!" On election day, he called her "a very outstanding person and a true American patriot."
These gatherings brought her a brief boost. A poll from Citadel showed that before the Pendleton rally, Andrews was trailing by 1 percentage point; however, among the voters surveyed after the rally, Graham’s support rate was 7 percentage points higher. A poll released by The New York Times/Siena ( New York Times / Siena ) in the last week showed that the two candidates’ support rates were tied.
A seat that Republican allies have held for decades
Republicans in South Carolina have been warning Graham for months. In October, C.J, the chairman of the Republican Party in Dorchester County who had criticized her during the primary elections, told CNN that he expected Wilson to win by 10 to 12 percentage points, while Graham would only win by 2 to 4 percentage points. Ben Jacobs reported that many within the party were dissatisfied with her obtaining this seat through nepotism, believing that Trump supported her due to her relationship with her brother. Some of them even organized a campaign to vote against Norman.
However, party funds still flowed to that state with Trump. The main super PAC of Senate Republicans sent reinforcements to this seat, which never needed defending in the first place. "American Mission" – the Republican camp within the network of super PACs in the artificial intelligence industry ("Leading the Future") – also invested about 2.7 million dollars to support her.
At the same time, Andrews also left room for Republicans. She rarely runs campaigns alongside national Democrats, and in the week before the election, she received endorsements from two former governors: Republican David Bisley ( David Beasley ) and Democrat Jim Hodges ( Jim Hodges ).
Unlike her brother, she has made it clear that she will not go against Trump. Last week she said, "I am willing to cooperate with anyone, including the president."
In 2016, Lindsey Graham was in opposition to Trump, but by 2020, Fox News reported that he had become one of Trump's most staunch supporters in the Senate. That year, Democrats spent over $100 million attempting to defeat him, but still lost by 10 percentage points. This year, Andrews raised $10.8 million, of which 60% came from small donors.
