(The Center Square) – Republican Sen. Darline Graham, sister of the late Sen. Lindsey Graham, and Democrat Dr. Annie Andrews headline Election Day battling for a six-year term representing South Carolina in the U.S. Senate.
Republican state Attorney General Alan Wilson, in a gubernatorial dual with Democrat Jermaine Johnson, joins Graham as a favorite to win. Seven U.S. House of Representatives seats are expected to again be split 6-1 Republicans.
South Carolinians are also choosing seven other executive offices: lieutenant governor, attorney general, secretary of state, agriculture commissioner, comptroller, education superintendent and treasurer.
All 124 seats in the House of Representatives are up for election. Republicans’ majority has been 89-35 in the most recent two-year term.
State senators have four-year terms running concurrent with presidential cycles. One special election, in District 15, is to be decided Tuesday.
Graham, previously commissioner of the South Carolina Commission for the Blind and in public office for the first time, was chosen by the governor to fill the rest of her brother’s term this year. He had easily won a June primary and was poised for a fifth six-year term. She drew support, including from second-term Republican President Donald Trump, to seek a spot on this year’s ballot and continue in office.
Andrews is a pediatrician by trade and polled much closer than normal state trends.
There hasn’t been a Democrat from the state in the U.S. Senate since Sen. Fritz Holdings retired in 1998, and this particular seat hasn’t had a Democrat since the day – Sept. 16, 1964 – the late Sen. Strom Thurmond during his second term switched to the Republican Party, becoming the state’s first GOP senator since 1879.