South Carolina voters began shaping the state’s future political landscape on Tuesday, locking in a major Senate nomination while pushing both the Republican and Democratic races for governor into high-stakes summer runoffs.
In the state’s high-profile U.S. Senate race, incumbent Republican Senator Lindsey Graham clinched the GOP nomination as he campaigns for a fifth term in office. Graham, a close political confidant of President Donald Trump, secured the victory following an early endorsement from the president. To bolster his 2026 re-election bid, Graham previously enlisted the state’s top Republicans, Senator Tim Scott and outgoing Governor Henry McMaster, to serve as his campaign chairs.
On the Democratic side of the Senate ticket, Charleston pediatrician Annie Andrews won her party’s primary nomination. Andrews, who previously ran an unsuccessful congressional campaign against U.S. Representative Nancy Mace in 2022, focused her primary platform on challenging Graham’s shifting political stances over his long career.
The general election remains a steep climb for Democrats in a state where Republicans historically dominate statewide races by double-digit margins. During his last re-election bid in 2020, Graham defeated Democrat Jaime Harrison by 10 percentage points, while Governor McMaster won his 2022 race by nearly 18 percentage points. No Democrat has won a U.S. Senate seat in South Carolina in decades.
While the Senate matchups are set for November, the race to succeed Governor McMaster remains entirely unresolved for both major parties.
In the Republican gubernatorial primary, Lieutenant Governor Pamela Evette and state Attorney General Alan Wilson have advanced to a runoff election scheduled for June 23. President Trump had heavily inserted himself into the primary, backing Evette over a field of challengers that included Representative Nancy Mace, coastal businessman Rom Reddy, and Representative Ralph Norman. Because no single candidate secured an outright majority on Tuesday, Evette and Wilson will face off in two weeks to determine the GOP standard-bearer.
The Democratic primary for governor is also headed to a June 23 runoff, though confusion remains over the final candidate matchups. State Representative Jermaine Johnson, a three-term lawmaker from the Columbia area and a rising figure within the state party, successfully advanced to the runoff round. The primary field also featured payday loan company founder Billy Webster, who self-funded his campaign with 2 million dollars, and attorney Mullins McLeod, who stayed in the race despite party pressure to withdraw following the release of dashcam video from a 2025 disorderly conduct arrest.
The ultimate winners of the November general election will take over for Governor McMaster, who has held the office since Nikki Haley stepped down during Trump’s first presidential term. Democrats face a historical hurdle in the fall, having last won a South Carolina gubernatorial election in 1998.
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