Deeper shades of red. Did voters green light a more conservative South Carolina?

Since 1993 when he was Republican Party chairman for South Carolina, Gov. Henry McMaster and others have been working hard to get more Republicans in office.

On Nov. 5, the governor and other Palmetto State Republicans achieved that goal by large margins.

“We’ve been on a roll heading towards whether you call it conservative Democrats or something else,” McMaster said. “This constitutional government, is the key to success, and that’s what we’ve been building and promoting. The Republican Party has found fertile soil here in South Carolina, and that’s good news.”

And fertile soil they’ve seeped into as Republicans earned a supermajority in the Senate in this month’s elections. The state has been primarily ruled by Republicans in recent decades as the party has built up wins, but the supermajority in the Senate means Democrats will have virtually no power in the Legislature.

With more than two-thirds of the Senate in Republican control, 34-12, its supermajority will enable them to end debate and overcome most Democratic efforts to prevent them from passing legislation.

South Carolina voters also selected Republican former President Donald Trump 58% to 40% over Vice President Kamala Harris. Trump got more votes than ever in South Carolina and won in three more counties than his first victory in 2016.

Since 2020, South Carolina’s population has significantly grown from 5.1 million to more than 5.3 million people, and is estimated to grow to nearly 6.4 million people by 2042, state projections show. South Carolina was also the fastest growing state in the U.S. in 2023, U.S. Census data shows.

Despite this population growth, only 26,244 more people cast a ballot for president in 2024 compared to 2020, but Trump’s won by 93,943 votes.

Do the November results signal voters want a more conservative South Carolina?

McMaster said he thinks voters are looking for more conservative candidates. He said the reason can be related to business, education, the economy, college or “common sense.”

“I think people are understanding more the difference between the policies and the philosophies of the two parties as they are today,” McMaster said at a press conference the day after the election. “And there’s no doubt South Carolina was flocking to the Republican philosophy and the Republican approach.

Further right candidates

Some Republicans, such as the Senate majority leader and House members, say the state has always been conservative, even when it was ruled by primarily Democrats. The term ‘conservative’ is interpreted widely. Some say there has been a shift toward “further right,” candidates, while others emphasize there is no one who is extreme in the South Carolina General Assembly.

Democrats and some former elected officials, however, say all South Carolina Republicans aren’t the same, citing the policies of the ultra-conservative House Freedom Caucus.

State Rep. Heather Bauer, D-Richland, said she does see a shift in some Republicans. They are further right and represent a smaller sect of the Republican Party, she said.

“It looks radically different, right? We don’t have the Katrina Shealys, we don’t have the Sandy Senns up there anymore. Republicans have gerrymandered these districts so much that we have these radical people winning because they can’t lose,” Bauer said. State Sens. Katrina Shealy, R-Lexington and Sandy Senn, R-Charleston, are two of the Republican women who joined Democrats to block a near total abortion ban.

The Freedom Caucus has been a hard-line faction of Republicans in the House for four years. And some legislation they have introduced, has been called ‘frivolous’ and ‘extreme’ by Democrats and some Republicans alike. Two years ago, some members of the Freedom Caucus wrote and sponsored a bill that would have made a woman who received an abortion eligible for the death penalty.

On Nov. 14, the House Republican Caucus released a six-point policy agenda for the upcoming session. Freedom Caucus members released their own agenda, with some similar points to the Republicans, but differences included a complete abortion ban with limits on access to mail-order medications and an end to public benefits for undocumented migrants.

Shealy, the former Lexington senator who was ousted along with two other Republican women senators in the June primaries, said the Republican Party is becoming so far right, there may be three parties in the Senate, much like what is seen in the House with the Freedom Caucus.

Shealy lost to now Sen. Carlisle Kennedy, a Republican who campaigned against Shealy on her abortion stance, saying she was not “pro-life” and not conservative enough.

“We have too many people in the Senate that will give in and let them have what they want because they’re afraid that if they don’t, they’re going to run somebody against them the next time, like they did me,” Shealy said. “You need people that aren’t afraid.”

State Rep. Todd Rutherford, D-Richland, said the answer to whether South Carolina became more conservative this election may have to wait until how the lawmakers elected can be observed governing. There were clearly losses in the Senate, but every race is different, he added.

For example, Rutherford said, people have been complaining about property taxes and corporate taxes since he was first elected in 1998, when South Carolina had a Democratic governor and Senate. As the state has elected more Republicans, people are still complaining about these issues, he said.

“The bulk of that shift, if anyone’s paying attention, tends to come from population growth as a result of migration from northern states. That’s what I’ve seen, and I don’t know that it’s any more Republican,” said Rutherford, the House minority leader.

Rutherford said it’s unfair and nearly impossible to know what kind of impact, how conservative or what kind of “extreme” new lawmakers will be, if at all, until session actually starts.

“I remember other Republicans that have been elected in the House that were described before they took office as being extreme that I dealt with one-on-one, and enjoy dealing with them, and felt like they had the best interest of South Carolina at heart,” Rutherford said. “So it goes back to, you know, one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter.”

Former state Sen. Dick Harpootlian, D-Richland, who was ousted by state Rep. Russell Ott, a Calhoun County Democrat, in the June primaries, referenced a quote from James Carville, an American political consultant, “the Democratic Party needs to be more concerned about people and less about pronouns,” to explain the results.

“There is a huge dissatisfaction, and you saw that happen nationally, in Democrats, the national Democratic Party, and apparently that leads over into local Democratic officials to deliver on issues like the economy, like taxes,” Harpootlian said.

State Senate Majority Leader Shane Massey, R-Edgefield, said the people who were elected Nov. 5 were not far right. The people elected were “well within the mainstream of where conservative South Carolinians are,” he said.

“I don’t think we’re seeing South Carolina say we want you to be extreme,” Massey said. “I do think, however, that if South Carolina sends you a big majority like that, they intend for you to use it.”

Just because Democrats are accusing the Republican candidates of being extreme, doesn’t mean they are, Massey said. Of course, there are some members of the General Assembly that are more conservative than others, but overall, they represent a mainstream conservatism that South Carolinians overwhelmingly support, he said.

“Additional Republicans were elected, that suggests to me that not only does the voting public feel like we’re moving in the right direction, but that we should continue that track,” Massey said. “There’s a responsibility that comes with that right.”

Massey said he doesn’t think there are people in the Senate who would allow for extremism. However, there are Senators who believe in “traditional conservative priorities.”

Shades of red in the Senate

State Sen. Josh Kimbrell, R-Spartanburg, said Republicans have slowly taken control over the Senate and legislation has reflected that. South Carolina voters have been Republican for a long time, but people may have been frustrated with results, Kimbrell said.

“Now we have a conservative governing majority that can actually advance things,” Kimbrell said of the supermajority. “This year, not only did we have four Republican flips from Democratic seats to Republican, we also had a number of primary challenges that brought in Republican members who are more committed to limited government and conservative philosophy than the other Republicans they beat in the primaries.”

The Senate doesn’t have the same dynamic as the House with factions, or caucuses, that represent different priorities, Kimbrell said. However, a lot of the new members coming into the Senate have similar values to himself, he said, adding that they’re fiscal and social conservatives, but still believe in governing responsibly.

“I wouldn’t say that you’ve got folks that are coming in who are somehow obstructionists,” Kimbrell said.

With the Senate having 12 Democrats, instead of 16, they become nearly irrelevant under the rules of the body, Harpootlian said. The Democrats won’t have rules to pass anything or maintain the floor except for the agenda. The Republicans can essentially ignore them with no problem.

“It’s really going to be whatever the caucus wants to give based on any sense of civility or collegiality. Over the last six years, I’ve seen that contract more and more,” Harpootlian said. He believes that will become even more difficult.

Harpootlian said the Senate may end up with some sort of “fringe” group, like the House has seen with the Freedom Caucus, as more conservative members enter.

Harpootlian said if voters are upset with the status quo, the status quo is Republicans. For the Democrats to take advantage of that, they must have an alternative vision, and it can’t be all based on social issues.

“In my six years there, I attempted to work with Republicans on issues involving economic development and other issues I thought that were important, and in some instances we could, in some instances we couldn’t, but I always made clear that I had an alternative,” Harpootlian said.

HAS SOUTH CAROLINA ALWAYS BEEN CONSERVATIVE?

State Rep. John McCravy, R-Greenwood, said South Carolina has always been very conservative. He said the difference he sees is that people are turning out to vote, not necessarily that the candidates are more far-right.

“I don’t think the population is becoming more conservative,” McCravy said. “I think that the conservatives are now seeing, the average person that goes to church on Sunday, works all week, is now seeing the importance of going to vote.”

McCravy cited South Carolina’s record breaking voter turnout this last election, and that people across the state and country turned out and voted “their convictions.”

South Carolina set new records for voter turnout exceeding past former years on early, absentee and day-of voting. The state’s total voter turnout was estimated to be about 2,557,000, compared to its previous record of 2,533,000 voters. Nearly 977,000 people cast their ballot on election day, and 1,472,000 early voted.

In 2008, voter turnout in South Carolina for the general election was 76.02%, compared to 2012 with 68.92%, 2016 with 67.85%, 2020 with 72.10% and 2024 with 76.76%.

“We don’t have people who advocate unreasonable and extreme positions,” McCravy said. “What we do have are politicians who are reflecting the voters’ priorities, and those priorities are a good economy, stopping the illegal immigration we have going on, promoting economic development, and keeping our traditional Christian values that we’ve always had in the state.”

McCravy said that’s not “far right,” that just “is right.”

People use monikers such as “far right,” but descriptors mean different things to different people, Ott said. Some Republicans who view themselves as conservative don’t view themselves as extreme, radical or far right, while others do.

Ott said if the entire state was just going more to the right, he wouldn’t have won his election Nov. 5.

“I think that you could clearly look at Senate District 26 and make the argument that, you know, look, I had a lot of Republican support. I had a lot of independent folks that clearly voted for Trump, that also voted for me,” the Calhoun Democrat said.

Ott succeeds longtime Lexington Democratic state Sen. Nikki Setzler, who announced earlier this year he would not run for reelection after serving in the upper chamber since 1977. The district was redrawn to combine parts of the districts where two Democrats were, both Setzler and Harpootlian, and essentially force the two into one seat.

Ott said he believes there is a large willingness to look at candidates as a whole, not just their party affiliation.

Redistricting was definitely a factor in how the election went, Ott said. It also contributes to the further right candidates in South Carolina, he added.

It’s not just Republicans, this can happen in the Democratic Party, too, he said. But the parties continue to drift away from each other, which is not a good thing, because a majority of South Carolinians may feel abandoned by either party, he said.

“There’s a lot of people out there that are just looking for principled, authentic, rational representation in both the House and the Senate,” Ott said.

Kimbrell said South Carolina’s Republican “didn’t always legislate like a Republican legislature,” and he believes that is why people voted the way they did.

“We believe in defending life, we believe in the Second Amendment, and we want people who actually do that, and I think we’ve seen that people get elected now who are going to advance that stuff, not just talk about it,” Kimbrell said.

When the three GOP women, Shealy, Penry Gustafson and Senn, lost their primaries, some attributed this to an effort by their opponents to highlight them as being “not conservative enough,” particularly on abortion. Massey, the Senate majority leader, called this a narrative the left tried to create. Also, the primary election was different from what South Carolina saw Nov. 5, particularly with those races, Massey said.

“The primary races, especially the ones that the three women senators, that had more to do with voters thinking that their senators had gotten caught up in a celebrity status and had lost much with them and preferred to be on the front page of The New York Times and on Good Morning America than to represent their interests,” Massey said.

Massey said he has no interest in “becoming like Washington, D.C.,” and that he has and will try to be receptive of minority positions and not be overbearing. That’s not just on Republican versus Democratic issues, he added, there are Republicans that are in the “minority,” on some issues as well.

“If you don’t like losing, find better candidates and talk about issues in a way that’s going to resonate with voters and win an election,” Massey said.

This story was originally published November 21, 2024 at 5:00 AM.