COLUMBIA — Five weeks ahead of South Carolina’s primaries, House GOP leaders launched an attempt Tuesday to redraw the voting lines for Congress.
“We will start a process to give ourselves options,” House Speaker Murrell Smith told reporters.
That starts with votes Wednesday on whether to add redistricting to a resolution governing what the Legislature can do after the regular session ends May 14. Adding to the allowed to-do list requires a two-thirds vote in each chamber.
“There is absolutely no promise whatsoever” that the Legislature will ultimately redraw the map, said Smith, R-Sumter.
The decision follows the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling last week that threw out Louisiana’s congressional map as unconstitutional gerrymandering based on race. The White House asked GOP leaders in both chambers to take a look at the ruling and South Carolina’s map.
Republicans’ stated goal is to un-gerrymander the 6th District, the only one among South Carolina’s seven U.S. House seats represented by a Democrat. After the 1990 census, federal courts prompted the Legislature to create a seat to give Black voters a voice. The result was a majority-Black 6th District, which U.S. Rep. Jim Clyburn has held ever since.
Clyburn, who’s seeking an 18th term in November, called the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Louisiana v. Callais “a giant step backward” and a dismantling of the 1965 Voting Rights Act.
“This decision threatens to send our country deeper into the thicket of never-ending redistricting fights, with repeated aggressive map redraws, protracted legal battles, and relentless partisan tugs-of-war, all of which are destined to result in more regressive Court decisions,” he said after last Wednesday’s decision.
Much remains unknown about how South Carolina’s attempt could affect voters.
“We can’t go to step two” without first determining whether the votes exist to proceed, Smith said.
One certainty, he said, is that the redistricting effort would affect congressional primaries only. Even if those contests are on pause, primaries for statewide and legislative races would proceed as scheduled June 9, he said.
If the House musters the necessary two-thirds vote to take up redistricting in a special session, the resolution’s chances in the Senate seem slim.
“That’s going to be a very tough vote in the Senate unless Democrats vote for it, and they might,” since a new map could improve their chances in November, said Senate Majority Leader Shane Massey.
The Edgefield Republican remains opposed to the idea despite getting two phone calls from President Donald Trump over the last two days.
“There was no pressure. He asked me to take a look at it. I’ve expressed my concerns,” he said, describing the calls as cordial conversations that lasted less than 10 minutes.
Those concerns include that the June 9 primary ballots have already been printed. Absentee ballots for military service members and other voters overseas were mailed more than a week ago. Early voting for the primaries begins May 26.
The state Election Commission is not aware of any similar situation of district lines changing so close to an election. A spokeswoman could not immediately answer questions about absentee voters and ballots sent.
7-0 or 5-2?
Smith acknowledged that an attempt to pick up another Republican seat is driving the attempt.
But Massey worries that South Carolina could end up with two or even three Democrats in Congress, rather than seven Republicans.
“I think if you try to get 7-0, you’re more likely to get 5-2,” Massey said. “Trying to get cute with this is more likely to cause a problem than be beneficial.”
It’s also unnecessary, he added. The U.S. Supreme Court has already determined that South Carolina’s map is not racially gerrymandered.
That was the crux of legal challenges following the post-2020-census redrawing of lines. GOP leaders acknowledged precincts were moved between the 1st and 6th districts to make the coastal 1st District safer for Republicans again. A population boom in the Lowcountry had made it more purple.
Upholding the map on partisan grounds, the nation’s high court rejected a lower court’s reasoning that the lines were racially gerrymandered.
That’s why last week’s ruling doesn’t affect South Carolina’s map, Massey said.
But he’s concerned further tinkering of the lines might not survive the state Supreme Court.
After the federal challenge on race failed, opponents of the map sued in state court on the argument that partisan gerrymandering violated the state constitution. South Carolina justices unanimously disagreed last September, but Chief Justice John Kittredge warned the outcome could be different in a “future challenge.”
Sen. Greg Hembree, a former solicitor, also stressed the map has “passed constitutional muster” in state and federal courts.
“I think it’s an absolutely terrible idea,” the Little River Republican said of a redistricting attempt in the coming weeks. Noting Republicans hold six of seven House seats, he said, “that’s success. We should declare victory and move on.”
What might a new map look like?
The attempted redraw would put candidates in limbo. Beyond potentially extending their campaigns an unknown length of time, congressional candidates may ultimately be drawn out of the district they’re seeking. The most crowded contest by far this year is the coastal 1st District: 10 Republicans, seven Democrats and two minor-party candidates.
Unknowns at this point include whether parties will need to start over with candidate filing.
Also unknown is what a new map would look like. One proposed earlier this year by Rep. Jordan Pace, who leads the chamber’s ultra-conservative Freedom Caucus, would put large swaths of voters into congressional districts they’ve never been in.
His redistricting bill got a hearing in January but no vote and no second meeting.
On Tuesday, he said he’s happy the idea’s getting traction.
“I hesitate to use the word ‘vindicated,’ but I feel a little vindicated,” said the Goose Creek Republican.
He called the map he presented a starting point.
In his suggested overhaul, one district would lump together voters of the Upstate, Midlands and Lowcountry regions along the entire border with Georgia. The 6th District — the one ostensibly being un-gerrymandered — would stretch from the suburbs of Charlotte, North Carolina, to the Charleston peninsula.
“You’ve got people in Lancaster County in a district with people in Charleton,” Massey said. “It’s just weird.”
Pace pointed at the 6th District’s existing lines in response. It spans 14 counties, from Columbia to the Charleston peninsula, and from the state’s southern border with Georgia east to the Pee Dee. While no longer a majority-minority district, it remains reliably blue.
It “covers vastly different groups of folks, from accents to barbecue sauces,” he said. “By nature of just not having high population density in a lot of the state, you’re going to have large districts, no matter who the representative is.”
The exception, he said, is the 4th District. South Carolina’s most compact district is confined to Greenville and Spartanburg counties.
What does the governor say?
Gov. Henry McMaster would not say Tuesday whether he supports redistricting.
“This is up to the Legislature,” McMaster told reporters hours ahead of the House GOP Caucus meeting.
“That’s their job: to study, to analyze and make a decision whether it’s necessary,” he added. He encouraged them to “understand what the recent Supreme Court case said, understand what the one in 2024 said, consider the facts and make that decision.”
McMaster also would not say whether he supported delaying the primary elections until the maps could be redrawn.
Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry signed an executive order delaying the May 16 congressional primaries in that state. More than 42,000 absentee ballots had already been cast, the Louisiana Illuminator reported Tuesday.
McMaster doesn’t have that power. And, as long as the Legislature passes a resolution setting the off-session rules, he also lacks the authority to call the Legislature back into session even if he wanted to do so.
Despite refusing to give an opinion on redistricting, the governor did remind legislators what should factor into their decisions.
“We’ve already started voting, particularly military people overseas,” he said, adding early voting is weeks away. “So, there will be ballots coming in anytime. There are some disruptions that go with changing the schedule.”
Seanna Adcox is a South Carolina native with three decades of reporting experience. After covering the S.C. Legislature and state politics for 18 years. she launched the SC Daily Gazette in November 2023 as the 37th state affiliate under the States Newsroom umbrella. Her previous employers include The Post and Courier and The Associated Press.
Jessica Holdman writes about the economy, workforce and higher education. Before joining the SC Daily Gazette, she was a business reporter for The Post and Courier.
SC Daily Gazette is part of States Newsroom, the nation’s largest state-focused nonprofit news organization.
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SC House advances efforts to redraw the state’s congressional districts
BY: JESSICA HOLDMAN - MAY 6, 2026 9:30 PM
COLUMBIA — South Carolina’s GOP controlled South Carolina House kicked off efforts to redraw the voting lines for Congress.
Five weeks ahead of South Carolina’s primaries, the House voted 87-25 along party lines Wednesday to add redistricting to a resolution governing what the Legislature can do after the regular session ends on May 14.
The vote does not guarantee redistricting will happen. But House Republican leadership said they will get the mapping process started immediately, even as the measure allowing off-session debate still needs a two-thirds vote in the Senate.
House Judiciary Chairman Weston Newton told reporters a bill will be introduced Thursday morning. Hearings will start Friday.
“We passed it. We’re going to start the process and see where that takes us,” the Bluffton Republican said.
What a new map would ultimately look like, the timeline, and the costs — to include the prospect of holding a separate, statewide election for Congress — remains to be seen.
Democrats tried repeatedly to get answers that Republicans said didn’t yet exist. They kept circling back to the response that the resolution approved Wednesday only opens the possibility of redistricting.
Democrats countered the vote opens the door to potentially months of uncertainty for voters and candidates, even as they stressed a new map may ultimately help Democrats in November.
The decision follows the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling last week that threw out Louisiana’s congressional map as unconstitutional gerrymandering based on race.
The White House asked Republican leaders in both chambers to take a look at the ruling and South Carolina’s map.
Rep. Justin Bamberg, first elected in 2014, lamented the national influence. South Carolina legislators used to take pride in the Statehouse not being like Washington: “It seemed like there was a D.C. shield around this place,” he said.
“This place was impervious to that, and decisions were often made about what’s best for the people in South Carolina,” the Bamberg Democrat added.
Rep. Gilda Cobb-Hunter, D-Orangeburg, chimed in that Wednesday’s vote was nothing more than “an effort to bring the national chaos down to South Carolina.”
Under the House proposal, the redistricting effort would affect congressional primaries only, likely pushing them back to a later date, Newton said. The primaries for other statewide and legislative races would proceed as scheduled June 9.
Even so, primary ballots have already been printed. Absentee ballots for military service members and other voters overseas were mailed more than a week ago and 193 ballots have already been turned in, according to state election officials. Early voting for the primaries begins May 26.
The attempted redraw would put congressional candidates in limbo. Beyond potentially extending their campaigns an unknown length of time, some may be drawn out of the district they’re seeking.
The legislators running for Congress
Among those candidates impacted is state GOP Rep. Mark Smith of Daniel Island, who is among 10 Republicans, seven Democrats and two minor-party candidates running for the coastal 1st District. They’ve collectively raised more than $5 million for their bids, according to their last campaign filings with the Federal Election Commission.
“To cancel this election that’s already underway, I worry what message that it would send to those voters who have already cast their votes in this election,” Smith said ahead of the vote.
“I think we need to be very slow and deliberate in this process,” he added. “Timing of this and the implementation of this, and the optics and the strategy matter.”
Still, Smith said he supported the effort. He voted with his GOP colleagues despite his misgivings.
Sen. Wes Climer of Rock Hill, who is running for the 5th District, also said he is “more than happy to support the president’s request that we pursue that in South Carolina.”
“No matter the issue and no matter how it affects you, a legislator can’t make policy choices on the basis of his own interest,” he said. “It is in the best interest of the people of South Carolina to maximize Republican vote share in the (U.S.) House of Representatives.”
Climer is the only Republican in the race to replace U.S. Rep. Ralph Norman, who’s running for governor. Two Democrats and a third-party candidate have also filed.
But Climer differs from House Republicans in wanting all state primaries delayed so they can take place on the same day, arguing it would “minimize voter confusion and save taxpayers a lot of money.”
Republicans’ efforts are focused on the 6th District, the only one among South Carolina’s seven U.S. House seats represented by a Democrat. U.S. Rep. Jim Clyburn, who’s seeking an 18th term in November, could not be reached for comment following the vote.
“We’re in a state right now where you have a supermajority in this body. You have a supermajority in the Senate,” as well as every statewide office, said Rep. Jermaine Johnson, D-Hopkins, who’s running for governor. “You have all the power that you could ever wish to have.”
House Democrats pushed back further saying there is no way a map can be drawn and approved in a month. Not to mention the court challenges that will almost certainly follow.
“We’re so afraid of upsetting the 9% of South Carolinians that vote in Republican primaries that we just trip over ourselves to do their bidding,” said Rep. Spencer Wetmore, D-Folly Beach. “If I thought today’s amendment was some altruistic effort to hear real South Carolinian voices, I might be inclined to support it.”
The effort also likely faces a tight vote in the Senate, where Majority Leader Shane Massey has called it unnecessary and potentially harmful to Republicans. Democrats in the House on Wednesday repeated his prediction that a new map may result in two or possibly three Democrats in South Carolina’s delegation rather than seven Republicans.
The U.S. Supreme Court, in legal challenges following the post-2020-census redrawing of lines, already determined that South Carolina’s map, while drawn based on politics, was not racially gerrymandered. GOP leaders acknowledged precincts were moved between the 1st and 6th districts to make the coastal 1st District safer for Republicans following a population boom in the Lowcountry that had turned it more purple.
The Edgefield Republican also raised concerns a redraw might not survive a challenge before the state Supreme Court.
After the federal challenge on race failed, opponents of the map sued in state court on the argument that partisan gerrymandering violated the state constitution.
That failed too.
But in his opinion last September, Chief Justice John Kittredge warned the unanimous decision did not categorically condone partisan gerrymandering: “A future challenge may present more fully developed constitutional violations” resulting in a different ruling, he wrote.
“We are seeing — and will continue to see — state legislatures race to further minimize and perhaps erase the representation of the state’s minority political party in Congress,” he wrote. “These results may, indeed, be in line with each respective state’s constitution and laws, but they collectively have the effect of diminishing our constitutional republic as a whole. This is a troubling prospect for those who adhere to our nation’s founding principle that the People are sovereign.”
The South Carolina chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, which was involved in those lawsuits, invoked Kittredge’s opinion in its statement coming out against this latest effort.
“Rigging electoral maps is wrong, no matter which party does it,” added its director, Jace Woodrum. “South Carolina lawmakers who choose to participate in this cynical race to the bottom are only demonstrating their fear of and contempt for the voters.”
Jessica Holdman writes about the economy, workforce and higher education. Before joining the SC Daily Gazette, she was a business reporter for The Post and Courier.
SC Daily Gazette is part of States Newsroom, the nation’s largest state-focused nonprofit news organization.
White House map of SC voting lines could help Democrats, GOP leader warns
Redistricting push would delay congressional primaries by 2 months
BY: SEANNA ADCOX AND JESSICA HOLDMAN - MAY 7, 2026 5:59 PM
COLUMBIA — A proposed overhaul of South Carolina’s voting lines for Congress would draw U.S. Rep. Jim Clyburn out of the district he’s represented for 34 years.
It could also make ruby red districts up and down the ballot suddenly in play for Democrats in November, warned Senate Majority Leader Shane Massey.
A map endorsed by the White House circulated Thursday at the Statehouse, as House Republicans introduced legislation that could change the entire congressional map.
One bill would draw the map. The other would set a new schedule for congressional primaries, which would be delayed by two months. Parties would have to re-open filing next month for candidates.
A first hearing is set for Friday morning.
Whether the process gets underway is up to the Senate, which on Thursday postponed debating a resolution that would allow the Legislature to take up redistricting after the regular session ends May 14.
Senators wanted to look at the map backed by the White House before voting on whether to jumpstart a process that would upend primaries less than five weeks away. A vote on the Senate floor is now expected Tuesday.
Proceeding with the possibility will take two-thirds approval in the chamber.
The GOP has supermajority control in both chambers. The House approved the resolution 87-25 along party lines Wednesday.
But at least some GOP senators, including Massey, oppose the idea.
Looking at the map only strengthened his opposition.
He contends several districts would become winnable for Democrats, which will bring an influx of dollars that will make holding onto seats more difficult for Republicans.
“If you’re making three or four seats competitive, you’re going to get better Democratic candidates, and you’re going to get more money for those candidates,” Massey said. “And when more money gets spent on the Democratic side, you’re going to affect down-ballot races.”
That includes state House seats to county councils, the Edgefield Republican said.
“There’s lots of things that we need to be concerned about, and nothing in that map has changed my opinion,” he said.
His predictions are opposite of what the GOP’s trying to do.
The goal is to pick up a Republican seat ahead of congressional midterms. Party leaders hope to flip the 6th District represented by Clyburn, the state’s lone Democrat in Congress.
He’s held the seat since a 1992 major redraw of the congressional map made the 6th a majority-Black district.
Clyburn is seeking an 18th term in November to a seat that remains reliably blue, though it’s no longer majority-minority due to population changes. The state’s longest-serving congressman worked with GOP legislators in the post-2020 census redistricting to preserve the district’s “strong Democratic tilt,” the U.S. Supreme Court noted in its 2024 ruling that rejected claims of racial gerrymandering.
Now GOP legislators are looking to move the 6th District entirely in an attempt to have an all-Republican congressional delegation.
“Republicans are trying to break apart South Carolina’s 6th District. Not because voters demanded it, but because Donald Trump requested it,” Clyburn wrote Thursday on X.
How the map changes
The most divided county in the proposed map is Richland County, home to the state’s capital and a Democratic stronghold, which splits three ways.
Currently represented by Clyburn and U.S. Rep. Joe Wilson, as part of the 2nd District, portions of Richland County would become part of the 3rd District along the border with Georgia to the state’s northwest corner.
That means Clemson and downtown Columbia would be in the same district — in other words, Tigers and Gamecocks would be grouped together, though the University of South Carolina’s central campus may be just barely in the 2nd District.
The northeastern chunk of Richland County would become part of the 5th District with counties along the border with North Carolina. And the Kershaw County suburbs of Columbia would be in the reworked 6th District.
The overhaul shifts the 6th District north.
It would newly span the entire Pee Dee region up to the suburbs of Charlotte, North Carolina, while splitting York County.
The map even splits the Fort Mill School District. Indian Land (the panhandle of Lancaster County) and Fort Mill east of Interstate 77 would be in the 6th District, while the rest of York County — including Baxter Village and Tega Cay — would stay in the 5th District.
That’s a “real problem for that base,” Massey said. “Those communities, they go together. They do everything together.”
No other incumbent is drawn out of the district they represent.
Wilson, of Springdale, would still live in the district he’s represented since 2001. But the 2nd District would newly pick up lots of blue areas that were in the 6th: all of Orangeburg and Calhoun counties as well as rural Allendale, Bamberg and Hampton counties.
Along the coast, Charleston County would split between the 1st and 7th districts, with much of it getting wrapped in with Georgetown and Horry counties along the Grand Strand.
Massey said putting two of South Carolina’s fastest-growing counties in the same district is a bad idea. While both Charleston and Horry are coastal counties, they’re “not the same culturally; they are not the same economically,” Massey said.
The effort follows the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling last week that threw out Louisiana’s congressional map as unconstitutional gerrymandering based on race.
President Donald Trump called Massey twice earlier this week to ask him to look at the ruling. Massey, who’s described the conversations as cordial and without pressure, said he’s opposed to the redistricting proposal, not the president.
“I like the guy,” he said. “But I want to make sure that it’s good for the people that I represent, and South Carolina as a whole, because that’s my job.”
If senators vote Tuesday to allow redistricting, the process would affect congressional primaries only. Primaries for other statewide and legislative races would remain on schedule June 9.
Even so, primary ballots have already been printed. Absentee ballots for military service members and other voters overseas were mailed more than a week ago and 193 ballots have already been turned in, according to state election officials. Early voting for the primaries begins May 26.
Unknowns include the cost of the process, to include holding a second set of primaries and potential runoffs for Congress in August. Lawsuits are almost certain.
The House put $2 million toward “redistricting litigation” in its second draft of the budget passed Wednesday.
Seanna Adcox is a South Carolina native with three decades of reporting experience. After covering the S.C. Legislature and state politics for 18 years. she launched the SC Daily Gazette in November 2023 as the 37th state affiliate under the States Newsroom umbrella. Her previous employers include The Post and Courier and The Associated Press.
Jessica Holdman writes about the economy, workforce and higher education. Before joining the SC Daily Gazette, she was a business reporter for The Post and Courier.
SC Daily Gazette is part of States Newsroom, the nation’s largest state-focused nonprofit news organization.
OPINION
Meet the legislature’s Cowardly Numbskulls
By Andy Brack
There’s a new caucus in the S.C. General Assembly of like-minded souls who want to make a real difference in South Carolina politics.
It’s not a revived Fat and Ugly Caucus, the bipartisan social group of lawmakers and insiders from more than a generation ago who drank lots of liquor and enjoyed a good time. It’s not the MAGA-friendly S.C. Freedom Caucus that boldly seeks offbeat, wacky solutions that would make Attila the Hun blush.
No, this new political group is the Cowardly Numbskull Caucus. Only Republicans who want to flout voting traditions and who are deathly terrified of President Donald Trump are admitted. Right now, that means every Republican senator or House member who thinks it’s a good idea to redraw congressional maps in mid-decade – just to dilute the majority-Black 6th Congressional District in hopes of turning it red.
Earth to Numbskulls: It won’t. Democratic Rep. Jim Clyburn will beat whoever you throw up against him, regardless of the lines. And more bad news: If you take Black voters out of the 6th District and move them into the Red-centric seats you wanted back in 2022, then what you’re going to do is make some of those districts more competitive for Democrats.
In other words, all of these cynical machinations could backfire, especially as Trump’s poll numbers continue to tank because he hasn’t lowered prices on gas and food. And he’s now gotten the country involved in a stupid war with Iran where we’re desperately negotiating to return things back to the way they were before we dropped thousands of bombs on the arid country.
Back to redistricting: While we’ve never liked the current gerrymandered congressional maps that state legislators drew after the 2020 census, we really don’t like the intentional manipulation of district lines now that the U.S. Supreme Court ruled recently that race could not be a significant factor in redrawing district lines. What the justices essentially did was give a green light to Southern legislatures to return to Jim Crow divisions in a mad attempt to hold onto the U.S. House in the fall.
(As an aside, if Republican policies were working in the country, there wouldn’t need to be so much manipulation of district lines to try to create new red districts. But sadly, all the Republicans at the federal level can do is to resort to cheating voters by changing the rules in midstream.)
Which brings us back to the Cowardly Numbskulls. Here’s the coward part: It’s pretty sad how terrified they are that Trump will take vengeance if they don’t redraw the map to try to squeak out one more GOP House seat. They’re probably having nightmares of having an endorsement being pulled by the increasingly mercurial Trump.
Even longtime Trump supporter Henry McMaster, South Carolina’s governor, had the courage to say no to calling the General Assembly back into special session to redraw maps. Why? In part because candidates have already filed for the primary, currently scheduled for June 9. Some absentee voters have already voted. Candidates have been spending campaign cash in buckets to get name recognition.
And here’s the numbskull part: Just because something can be done doesn’t mean it’s good for the state of South Carolina and voters. In the rush to redistrict, we’re seeing the true colors of those who want to turn back the clock, not move forward. We’re seeing the erosion of our constitutional republic in favor of more authoritarian crap.
If Republicans in the legislature insist on this idiotic redistricting at mid-decade, there will be unintended consequences. That’s what happens when numbskulls are in charge.
Andy Brack is editor and publisher of the Charleston City Paper and Statehouse Report. Have a comment? Send to: feedback@statehousereport.com.
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