Two erstwhile allies of President Trump who gave up their seats in Congress to run for governor of South Carolina failed to make it into a runoff election on Tuesday. Pamela Evette, the Trump-endorsed lieutenant governor, came in first place, followed by Alan Wilson, the state’s current attorney general. The two colorful members of Congress, Ralph Norman and Nancy Mace, lagged far behind.
Like most Republican primaries in this MAGA era, South Carolina’s gubernatorial race was defined by President Donald Trump’s famous “Complete and Total Endorsement.” The race also showed the level of loyalty Trump demands in exchange for his support and the emerging rifts in the GOP that have seen some of its elected officials cross the president despite his influence over the party faithful.
The AP called the race just after 9 p.m. ET. With an estimated 54% of the vote counted, Evette had 29.1% and Wilson had 26.5%. Norman had 16.4% and Mace had 11.4%. A fifth candidate, businessman Rom Reddy, had 14.9%.
Evette and Wilson were running in a crowded Republican field that included the two members of the state’s congressional delegation, Norman and Mace. Both Norman and Mace were, at one time, fairly staunch Trump allies and their various antics should be familiar to devoted TPM readers. However, in Trump’s second term, the pair found themselves failing Trump’s standards for fealty. This left them frozen out of the state’s June 23 runoff race.
Trump’s endorsement of Evette was widely seen as a nod to his longtime ally Henry McMaster, who became the state’s longest serving governor last year. McMaster, who is term-limited, spent extra time in the post because he initially took office after his predecessor, Nikki Haley, joined Trump’s first administration. Evette was McMaster’s chosen successor and, when Trump announced his endorsement of her on Truth Social late last month, the president noted, “I hear, Henry McMaster, Jr., the brilliant and very competent son of Henry and Peggy, will be running with her as the next Lieutenant Governor.” The younger McMaster subsequently declared he didn’t want that job.
As much as he may have wanted to do a favor for McMaster and his family, Trump also revealed another motivation behind the endorsement in his Truth post where he lauded Evette as “the only South Carolina Gubernatorial Candidate to Endorse me as soon as I launched my 2024 Presidential Campaign.” Evette’s high-profile rivals in the primary were not early Trump supporters in that race.
Norman, a member of the far right House Freedom Caucus, is almost certainly most familiar to TPM readers for being such a raving January 6 dead ender that he called for Trump to declare “Marshall Law” as they fought to overturn the president’s loss in the 2020 election. That misspelled and extreme message, which we exclusively exposed when we published the series of texts sent to Trump’s former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, inspired an iconic piece of TPM merch.
“Our LAST HOPE is invoking Marshall Law!! PLEASE URGE TO PRESIDENT TO DO SO!!” Norman wrote to Meadows .
In the next presidential election, Norman’s ally, Nikki Haley, was running against Trump in the Republican primary. Norman initially gave Haley his support. He was the only member of Congress to do so. Since then, Norman has attempted to get back on the Trump train and has even touted his status as one of the members of Congress who is “most closely aligned” with the president’s agenda. However, even that is apparently not enough for Trump, who never forgets a slight.
Mace is perhaps best known for targeting trans people with discriminatory legislation and obsessive social media posting. The congresswoman, who has denied wrongdoing, has also been embroiled in an ethics scandal for allegedly overbilling Congress about $9,500 to cover her personal housing costs. And late last year, Mace made national headlines after she cursed out security agents at the Charleston airport.
In addition to all that drama, Mace has been in an on-again-off-again relationship with the president, which, of late, has been distinctly in the “off” phase.
Unlike Norman, Mace was among the Republicans who briefly criticized Trump in the aftermath of the January 6 attack. As the 2024 presidential election approached, Mace initially called for a “new voice” before coming around and siding with Trump.
The most recent beef between Mace and Trump stemmed from her vote to support the release of the Epstein files. Trump had a long and tumultuous relationship with Jeffrey Epstein, the late billionaire financier and sex offender who victimized young women while maintaining ties to many rich and powerful figures. The president has denied any wrongdoing related to Epstein, but he also fought against the release of documents related to the investigation. Ultimately, when the files were published, Trump was named over 6,000 times even amid some apparent cleanup efforts from his DOJ.
With the right wing’s QAnon-fueled belief that Trump was a crusader against elite sex trafficking rings, the Epstein Files have caused some tension and distrust within his movement. That dissension in the ranks is also coming as high costs and upset over the war in Iran has brought Trump’s approval rating to record lows. Against that backdrop, Democrats are doing well in races across the map and even eyeing some states where they have traditionally fared poorly. However, South Carolina’s governor’s race, which Democrats have not won since 1998, remains a longshot.
Jermaine Johnson, a member of the South Carolina state legislature and a former professional basketball player, secured Democrats’ Senate nomination with 58.7% of the vote.
Mace’s latest break with the president is evidence of the Epstein-fueled split within the GOP. However, her performance in the primary also shows the limitations of any strain between Trump and his base. In interviews leading up to primary day, Mace blamed her vote on the files and Trump’s endorsement of Evette for costing her the frontrunner status she enjoyed early on in the contest.
“That’s the sole reason I didn’t get the endorsement, because I voted to release the Epstein files, and I’m okay with that,” Mace told Politico last week.
While Mace tried to put on a brave face, she also clearly hoped voters wouldn’t be swayed by Trump’s pick. Ahead of the voting, she told Fox News that she expected Trump’s endorsement to have limited impact.
“I disagree with this endorsement,” said Mace. “And I’m going to vote for myself. I’m asking voters in South Carolina to vote for me as well.”
Sadly for Mace, Trump’s choice apparently mattered more to voters than hers.
