An SC legislative seat from Surfside Beach is now available. Who might fill it?

When South Carolina state Rep. Russell Fry (R-Surfside Beach) announced earlier this week that he would run for Congress against U.S. Rep. Tom Rice (R-Myrtle Beach), it came with a consequence: He said he wouldn’t seek reelection to the seat he currently holds in the state legislature.

“I will not be a candidate in two races,” he said in an interview. “I’m running for Congress.”

That means Surfside Beach will have an opportunity to select a new representative in the South Carolina House of Representatives.

The big question is who might fill that seat.

At this point, Fry and local political consultants said, it’s too early to know who might run for the seat, which stretches from Dick Pond Road, past the South end of Myrtle Beach, to Garden City and part of Murrell’s Inlet.

But three consultants who work with candidates across the Grand Strand and Horry County suggested that several people who have previously run for seats in Columbia could seize the opportunity.

One of those people is Horry County Council member Tyler Servant, who currently represents Surfside Beach and Garden City on the council, the consultants said. Servant ran against Fry for the District 106 House seat in a 2015 special election. He performed well in the primary, but lost to Fry in a runoff election.

“I think (Fry running for Congress) sets it up for Tyler because he ran before and he didn’t lose by that much before,” said Donald Smith, a Conway-based consultant who’s worked for county council chairman Johnny Gardner and who is currently working on Horry County Board of Education Chairman Ken Richardson’s race against Rice.

However, Smith noted, he’s not been contacted by any candidates seeking to run for the seat and could only speculate who may run.

Other political consultants, including Walter Whetsell, who’s run all of Rice’s campaigns since 2012, as well as campaigns for Fry and other Republicans across South Carolina, said other candidates who have run for state legislature seats in the area could also be contenders, including the attorney and radio show host Reese Boyd III.

Boyd ran against state Sen. Stephen Goldfinch in 2016, but lost in a runoff election. County council member Cam Crawford, who along with his wife, state Rep. Heather Ammons Crawford (R-Socastee), run local political campaigns, agreed that Boyd could be a viable candidate in the district.

Several candidates, including Servant and Boyd, Whetsell said, “have run in this district before and I would suspect that they would look carefully at another race.”

Servant said he’s heard from a number of people since Fry’s announcement who have encouraged him to run. However, he said, he’s not jumping into the race at this point.

“Ever since Russell’s announcement, a lot of people have reached out to me encouraging me to run but it’s really not something I’m considering at this point,” he said.

Boyd didn’t return a phone call seeking comment.

Still, with the primary nearly a year away, some interviewed by The Sun News said the race will likely take shape in early 2022. The filing deadline for candidates is in March.

Fry, for his part, said he hasn’t had any conversations with potential candidates.

“I haven’t had conversations with anybody. I’m not sure who or what or when or where or how,” he said. “I think it’s so new that everyone is saying, ‘You’re running for Congress?’”

This story was originally published August 9, 2021 at 10:03 AM with the headline "An SC legislative seat from Surfside Beach is now available. Who might fill it?."