Former Bernie Sanders organizer wants to be SC’s 1st black Hispanic congressman
The 2020 election has started in South Carolina’s congressional races, too.
The Palmetto State, already seeing potential 2020 presidential candidates flooding in, now has its first declared candidate for Columbia-area U.S. House district in next year’s election.
A former organizer for U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders’s 2016 presidential campaign has announced he will run against U.S. Rep. Joe Wilson, R-Springdale, in the Midlands’ 2nd District in 2020.
If elected, Lawrence Nathaniel, a 25-year-old Columbia Democrat, would be South Carolina’s first African-American Hispanic congressman, he said in a campaign announcement.
Nathaniel’s announcement focused on income inequality and the need for “leadership that are woke to today’s struggles.”
“As long as we turn a blind eye to the pain of those suffering under our system’s oppression, we can never move forward as one body of people,” Nathaniel said in a statement. “We no longer want to live in a country where money is more important than humanity or where criminality is confused with mental health.”
Nathaniel is the founder of a group called People Demand Action. He took part in a People’s March on Washington last year, calling for the impeachment of Republican President Donald Trump.
Wilson has represented the 2nd District since 2001. The district includes Aiken, Barnwell and Lexington counties as well as portions of Orangeburg and Richland counties.
This story was originally published February 25, 2019 at 12:31 PM.
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