Can former Democrat David Pascoe win SC GOP nomination for AG? What history says
First Judicial Circuit Solicitor David Pascoe is trying to accomplish a feat that hasn’t been done since 1994. He wants to win a statewide election as a Republican, after switching from the Democratic Party.
Pascoe, who earlier this year switched to the GOP after being elected as a Democrat six times, formally kicked off his campaign Monday to become the next attorney general in South Carolina.
His launch includes visits to GOP groups in the Lowcountry on Monday, a stop at the State House Tuesday, and visit with the Greenville County Republican Party Tuesday evening.
He’ll now have to convince GOP voters he’s the best person for the job while also convincing them he’s truly a Republican, especially with a voting base that at times demands complete loyalty to the brand. He’ll need to convince voters he didn’t just switch to improve his chances of winning the 2026 election.
“I didn’t want to carry the label of a party that cares more about convicted criminals than it does victories,” Pascoe told the Richland County GOP in June. “I didn’t want to be a member of a party that had absolutely no room for lifelong, pro-life, pro-capital punishment prosecutor like myself.”
If Pascoe is successful, he’ll pull off a feat accomplished by the likes of former Gov. David Beasley, former Superintendent of Education Molly Spearman and the late U.S. Sen. Strom Thurmond: Be a former Democrat, run as a Republican and win statewide.
Winning the Republican nomination in the race for attorney general will be key because the last time a Democrat won a statewide election in the reliably red state was 2006.
“We got a lot of people who are interested in running and being the Republican nominee,” said Drew McKissick, the SC GOP chairman. “There’s no doubt that Republican nomination is obviously worth having. Democrat nominations, not so much.”
For decades, others have switched from the Democratic Party to the Republican Party, often with local fanfare and promotion from the state GOP.
“It’s because of the work that our people have done around the state when it comes to the voters in their areas, their counties, etc. And you see the straight ticket numbers we put up in the past that’s indicative of the support for the party,” McKissick said.
When asked how difficult it will be for Pascoe, who gained statewide attention for the conviction of former Republican House Speaker Bobby Harrell and investigation into Richard Quinn Sr., to win the Republican nomination, McKissick said, “that’s a good question. We’ll see.”
McKissick said hundreds of thousands of GOP voters will have to decide whether they want Pascoe as their attorney general.
“They’re going to have to go and convince you are the better man or woman for the job, period,” McKissick said of statewide candidates. “(Voters are) gonna have the final say on that, and you’ve got 10 months to do it. That’s really the answer to that question. That’s their decision.”
Convincing GOP voters he aligns with Republican values
Pascoe has already faced some skepticism about his allegiances and throughout the campaign will probably have to answer questions about if whether he’s truly a Republican.
Rusty DePass, a real estate broker who attended Pascoe’s Richland County GOP appearance, said Pascoe is “late to the party” because others in the state had made the switch to the Republican Party many years ago.
“Somebody who is as recently a convert as he is, is liable to run into problems with people like us who made that transition a long time ago,” DePass said.
“It doesn’t mean we wouldn’t support (Pascoe), but I do think that’s a complaint that he’s likely to hear (as) he runs for attorney general,” DePass said.
When pressed by an attendee at the Richland County GOP meeting if he had voted for President Joe Biden or Vice President Kamala Harris, Pascoe wouldn’t say.
“I’m going to abide by my rule that I came up with 15 years ago and that I regret to this day not abiding by 2020,” Pascoe said. “Because of my job as a prosecutor, I’m never going to talk about who I voted for in a D.C. election. I will never again endorse in D.C. whether it’s for Congress, Senate or president. Sir, I made the mistake in doing that once before, and I’m not doing it again.”
Since switching party affiliations, Pascoe has been making the rounds at GOP events around the state.
Pascoe was in the Democratic Party for 20 years before he announced he would switch to the Republican earlier this year.
Pascoe has been raising money for his bid for attorney general. His Aug. 6 initial financial report included $123,000 in contributions. He had $98,000 from lawyers or law firms. More money is expected to come into the campaign in the near future as Republican Bart Daniel, who was the lead prosecutor during Operation Lost Trust, plans to hold a fundraiser in the coming weeks for Pascoe.
Money raised by Pascoe so far includes notable donations from Democratic Party members.
Contributions included $1,000 from Chris Kenney, an attorney who has done work for the Democratic Party and helped Democratic campaigns, and two $3,500 donations from former state Sen. Dick Harpootlian, who previously served as the chairman of the South Carolina Democratic Party.
“I’m convinced he would be an extraordinary attorney general. He wouldn’t be a Democratic attorney general, he wouldn’t be a Republican attorney general. He would be an attorney general. We haven’t had one of those in 40 years and if I could do something to help him do that, I’m going to do it,” said Harpootlian, who first hired Pascoe as an assistant solicitor in 1991.
That doesn’t stop Pascoe from criticizing Democrats as he pitches himself as someone who is taking on corruption in Columbia, and doesn’t care about Washington politics
He complains about former state Sen. Gerald Malloy, D-Darlington, saying he obstructed addressing criminal justice issues. Pascoe criticizes how the Democratic Party kept a primary challenger off of the ballot in the Charleston county sheriff’s race in 2024. And he objected to how Biden commuted death row sentences of 37 people about a month before leaving office.
“Look, you can call me a DINO. You can call me a RINO. You call me an SOB, just don’t call me a liberal because I’m more conservative, especially on criminal justice issues. I’m more conservative than every General Assembly member up there in Columbia,” Pascoe said.
Others who have switched
Switching from the Democratic Party to the Republican Party has happened for decades in South Carolina as the GOP has increased its influence and control over the state.
Between 2019 and 2023, 13 elected officials in South Carolina switched from Democratic Party to the Republican Party, including Darlington County Coroner Todd Hardee, Edgefield County Coroner David Burnett, and Abbeville County Sheriff Ray Watson.
Another notable switch, played into a State House election in 2024.
In 2022, then Dorchester County Councilwoman Harriet Holman made the switch. She went on to run for the state House and unseated state Rep. Joe Jefferson, D-Berkeley, in 2024. It was a notable party switch because in 2020, Holman served on the Democratic National Committee’s platform committee.
Others who have made the switch include current state Senate President Thomas Alexander, Senate Judiciary Chairman Luke Rankin, Senate Finance Chairman Harvey Peeler and previous finance chairman, the late Hugh Leatherman.
Spearman, a Republican who served state superintendent of Education from 2015 to 2023, first served as a state representative in the 1990s. She was elected as a Democrat, but then switched to the Republican Party in mid-1990s.
“You had … more and more Democrats who were looking to switch because of issues like the life issue and other social and culturally conservative issues (that) brought them across,” McKissick said.
Winning statewide after a recent switch is another challenge.
Thurmond was elected governor as a Democrat in 1946 and then as a U.S. senator in the 1950s. He also ran for president in 1948 as a Dixiecrat. He then switched to the Republican Party in 1964 staying in office until he decided not to run for reelection in the 2002 campaign.
Beasley was House Speaker pro-tem as a Democrat when he switched parties in the early 1990s before he was elected for governor in 1994.
“Local stuff is one thing for somebody to do that and then run statewide is very different,” McKissick said. “In (Beasley’s) case, though, like I said, it was more driven by issues and the social, cultural conservative issues than anything else. He leapt off of those issues and immediately had contacts and friends in the pro-life and pro-family movement in the Upstate and other places like that, because he’d been working with them in the legislature on pro life legislation. So they welcomed him with open arms.”
