By Richard Cowan
WASHINGTON, Aug 25 (Reuters) – Voters in South Carolina will decide whether they want to establish a Graham family dynasty as they go to the polls on Tuesday in a Republican primary pitting Darline Graham against U.S. Representative Ralph Norman.
Graham, 62, is the sister of Lindsey Graham, who died at the age of 71 on July 11, having served in Congress for 31 years — 23 of those in the U.S. Senate. She subsequently was appointed to fill out his Senate term that expires at the beginning of January.
Tuesday’s primary will decide whether the current Senator Graham or Norman will be the Republican nominee in the November 3 election, facing Democratic Annie Andrews, a pediatrician, for a six-year Senate term.
President Donald Trump has endorsed Graham and held a rally for her on Friday in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, where he placed the spotlight on himself and proclaimed, “I am on the ballot” on Tuesday.
The primary election will be another in a series of tests of Trump’s sway with voters in this year’s midterm elections. He is trying to use his bully pulpit to prevent Democrats taking control from Republicans of the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate.
One former Senate Republican aide, noting Graham’s lack of political experience or strong base of supporters, said the election could turn on whether “Trump can push her over the line just on his endorsement.”
Trump, in a posting on his Truth Social network defended the power of his candidate endorsements. But without giving specific names one day before the South Carolina primary, he added that the “few” such candidates who lost were endorsed only because of his “loyalty” to them. “It was almost impossible for them to win but, I felt obligated to go with them because they were, in my opinion, good people!” he wrote.
Meanwhile, MAGA INC., a super PAC that supports Trump has spent $827,711 in support of Graham, according to its filing on Monday with the Federal Election Commission.
If Norman becomes the nominee in South Carolina and goes on to win the November election, he has a reputation in the House of Representatives of putting up resistance, at least temporarily, to some Republican leadership demands, which could preview how he would operate as a senator.
For her part, Graham used the rally to try to recover from what has been cast as a debate misstep when she said she was not knowledgeable about national security issues, on which her late brother had expertise.
“Guilty as charged,” Graham proclaimed at the rally. Instead, she focused her remarks on her stances on domestic issues, including Trump’s immigration clampdown and anti-abortion advocacy — matters that likely are higher on South Carolina voters’ list of concerns than foreign policy.
She had never held public office until her appointment to the Senate, having previously held positions advocating for persons with physical disabilities.
South Carolina, a deep red state, has overwhelmingly embraced Trump in all three of his runs for president and is not likely to play a role in the Republican-Democratic battle for the control of Congress.
Norman, 73, a longtime real estate developer, has spent nearly a decade in the U.S. House. He mounted an unsuccessful bid for governor, finishing third in a June primary.
He has been a leading member of the right-wing House Freedom Caucus, but endorsed the more moderate Nikki Haley, a former governor of South Carolina, in her 2024 failed presidential bid.
Nonetheless, Norman supports many of Trump’s initiatives, including a nationwide tightening of requirements for casting votes throughout the United States, which Democrats say would make it more difficult for eligible citizens to participate in elections.
Norman also has backed Trump in opposing congressional constraints on the U.S. war against Iran.
Earlier this month, Graham and Norman were the two top vote-getters in the Republican primary’s 10-candidate field, but neither garnered enough support to avoid Tuesday’s runoff.
In that election, Graham won 32.7% of the vote to Norman’s 24.6%, raising the possibility of a tight race to pick a nominee on Tuesday.
(Reporting by Richard Cowan; Additional reporting by Nolan D. McCaskill; lEditing by Michael Learmonth and Alistair Bell)
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