Sen. Darline Graham has won South Carolina’s Republican Senate primary runoff, defeating Rep. Ralph Norman and securing the GOP nomination to seek a full six-year term in the seat previously held by her late brother, Sen. Lindsey Graham. The Associated Press called the race Tuesday night.
Graham’s victory caps an extraordinarily rapid rise for the 62-year-old political newcomer. South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster appointed her to temporarily fill her brother’s seat following Lindsey Graham’s sudden death in July, and she quickly entered the special election with the strong backing of President Donald J. Trump.
With more than 90% of ballots counted, Graham held roughly 52% of the vote compared with about 48% for Norman. The relatively close result came after a bruising two-week runoff campaign that exposed divisions among South Carolina Republicans.
Trump invested heavily in Graham’s candidacy after personally encouraging her to run. He traveled to Myrtle Beach on Friday for a rally on her behalf and held a tele-rally Monday night, repeatedly urging his supporters to turn out as though the president himself were appearing on the ballot.
Trump-aligned MAGA Inc. also poured nearly $830,000 into voter outreach supporting Graham during the closing days of the campaign. Her victory provides Trump with a notable endorsement win after several of his preferred candidates suffered defeats in Republican primaries earlier this year.
Graham entered the runoff as the leading candidate after receiving nearly 33% in the Aug. 11 special primary. Norman, a longtime conservative congressman and House Freedom Caucus member, finished second with roughly 25%, forcing the two into Tuesday’s head-to-head contest.
The campaign became considerably more contentious after Graham struggled with a national-security question during their runoff debate. Asked about the significance of Taiwan and the South China Sea, Graham acknowledged that she was “not that informed on national security” and said foreign policy was not her area of expertise.
Norman and his supporters seized on the answer, arguing that the Senate was no place for on-the-job training. Graham instead embraced her outsider status and argued that South Carolinians were more concerned about issues such as grocery prices and affordability than whether their senator could immediately answer every foreign-policy question.
Trump stood firmly behind Graham after the controversy. He defended her as intelligent and honest, arguing that she was willing to admit what she did not know instead of delivering a rehearsed political answer. His decision to personally campaign for her demonstrated how invested he had become in ensuring she survived the runoff.
Norman attempted to make experience the defining issue of the campaign. The veteran congressman portrayed Graham as an unknown candidate benefiting from her family name and establishment support, while presenting his own years in Congress as evidence that conservatives knew exactly what they would get from him.
Graham countered that being a political newcomer should be considered an advantage rather than a weakness. At Trump’s rally, she openly acknowledged that she was not a career politician and compared her outsider status to Trump’s own lack of elected experience before he first entered the White House.
Graham will now face Democratic nominee Annie Andrews in November. Republicans will enter that contest as strong favorites in a state that has not elected a Democratic U.S. senator since 1998 and that Trump carried by 18 percentage points in the 2024 presidential election.
Tuesday’s result means Graham has survived the most immediate challenge to keeping her brother’s former seat. After overcoming a crowded primary, a damaging debate moment and an experienced conservative opponent, she now heads into November with Trump’s endorsement and the Republican nomination firmly in hand.
The post Darline Graham Wins South Carolina GOP Senate Runoff With Trump’s Backing appeared first on Real News Now.
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