SC Dem lawmaker, Senate hopeful talks ‘sleeper’ candidates, under-the-table fundraising

South Carolina state Rep. Krystle Matthews told a state prison inmate in a recorded call that she hoped drug dealers would contribute to her U.S. Senate campaign using family members’ names and suggested Democrats run as “secret sleepers” in Republican primaries.

The comments are snippets of a mostly chatty phone call with David Solomon Ballard enlisting his help with her campaign. The tapes were made public by Project Veritas, a right-wing organization that secretly tapes progressive politicians and edits the tapes to show the politician in an unflattering light.

Matthews is in a runoff Tuesday for the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate with Catherine Fleming Bruce, an author and preservationist. The winner will face Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C., in the November election. Results of the runoff were not available by press time.

In an interview with Raphael James of Live 5 News Tuesday, Matthews said she did not know Ballard and did not know he was an inmate until after the call was over. She said releasing the tape was a political hit job, and she was not going to be contrite about what was said..

“So if I was really getting dope money, what I had said that I was struggling to raise money for my campaign. So of course, the statement was tongue in cheek, it was not literal.”

She said, “The real uncut truth revealed is that sometimes when Black folks talk to Black folks, we talk in a certain way in private no different than when parents says to their language around their children, for example..”

She said her supporters know she speaks passionately about what she believes.

“Nothing I said was untrue. And everything I said are also things that I’ve already talked about throughout my campaign. I don’t run from anything,” she said.

The South Carolina Department of Corrections recorded the call, as it does all inmate phone calls, and it was somehow leaked to Project Veritas. The portion of the tape released by Project Veritas is two minutes of a 40-minute call in which Matthews gives her opinions about legislators and other Black leaders and says she hasn’t seen as many backstabbers as she has in the Legislature since high school.

Matthews and a campaign aide did not return repeated messages seeking comment.

Ballard is serving a 10-year sentence after pleading guilty in 2018 to threatening Aiken County Sheriff Michael Hunt and injuring a South Carolina Law Enforcement Division agent during his arrest in December 2017.

Ballard called a woman, who then called Matthews. Three-way calls are not allowed by the Corrections Department, corrections spokesperson Chrysti Shain said. She said they are looking into how Project Veritas obtained the tape. She sent the recording of the entire conversation to The State.

“Where the f- is my Black people with money?” Matthews said on the call. “I don’t care about no dope money. Give me that dope boy money. S- where the f-ing dope? Where are the duffel-bag boys. Get you — find me someone from your family that don’t even know you donating to my campaign and put that s- under they names.”

They both talk about upending state and local government to get more like-minded people in office.

“We need to get enough of us in there so we can flip some s- from the inside out,” she said.

Trav Robertson, chairman of the S.C. Democratic Party, declined to comment Monday.

South Carolina Republican Party Chairman Drew McKissick responded to the tape saying, “She knows that Democrats can’t win in South Carolina because of their radical ideas and failed agenda, so her only option is to recruit ‘secret sleepers’ to try and trick voters. We’ve been saying it for years, but her plan is further proof why we need partisan registration and closed primaries in South Carolina.”

Past legislative efforts to close primaries have been unsuccessful.

Reporter Stephen Pastis contributed to this report.

This story was originally published June 28, 2022 at 5:00 AM.