With hours on the clock until polls close, Republicans are betting that Senator Darline Graham—the temporary fill-in for her late brother, Lindsey Graham—will be iced out of South Carolina’s GOP runoff race. Graham is up against Representative Ralph Norman, a five-term lawmaker who has represented the Palmetto State in various legislative capacities since 2005.
The junior Graham took the reins of her sibling’s powerful office last month, after the 71-year-old suddenly passed away from an aortic dissection. Despite having zero relevant experience or qualifications, Graham gained the president’s endorsement and was subsequently appointed by South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster.
Within the span of a few short weeks, the 62-year-old undertook a gambit to make her interim responsibilities more permanent, throwing her name on the ballot to be formally selected by the state electorate. The money poured in behind her, with chief executives, lobbyists, and prominent Republican donors pumping thousands of dollars into her nascent campaign, violating the weekly thresholds set by the Federal Election Commission.
The country was stunned earlier this month when Graham pulled ahead of more than half a dozen candidates in the Republican primary—but now, some Republicans believe that may have been the zenith of her political career.
Public opinion on Graham plummeted last week when she flopped on a softball debate question regarding Taiwan, confessing that “national security is not my thing.” In the same debate, Graham forgot the population of her own state, falsely claiming that South Carolina’s population is 50 million people—more than New York and Florida combined. Fact check: The state’s population is fewer than six million people.
Multiple Republican sources told NOTUS that, despite Donald Trump’s efforts, the sexagenarian is increasingly unlikely to win South Carolina’s primary runoff.
“You’re running a campaign with a virtual unknown that took on all of her brother’s unfavorables without any of the goodwill that her brother has in a very short-sprint special election,” one Republican operative told NOTUS. Exactly why Graham is in a bad position in the race “isn’t rocket science,” according to the source.
A lack of reliable or neutral polling has left much of the country’s electoral odds in the dark, including in South Carolina.
“Tomorrow’s election is the biggest black box in recent memory here,” a South Carolina–based Republican operative told NOTUS.
Whoever pulls through the runoff Tuesday evening will eventually have to face off against Democrat Annie Andrews, a pediatrician, in the November general election. (Though the last time South Carolina elected a Democrat to the Senate was in 1998.)
But unlike other midterm-bound candidates who have been advised by party leaders to separate themselves from the president’s negative polling, Graham still needs to ride Trump’s brand if she wants to win big.
“Her only good is hyper-engaged Trump voters. There is no Darline Graham voter,” the operative told NOTUS. “No one’s voting for Darline because of Darline.”
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