A key Republican super PAC will commit $5 million to support Sen. Darline Graham’s South Carolina Senate race, people familiar with the matter confirmed on Tuesday, as President Trump escalates his attacks on her opponent, Democrat Annie Andrews.
Although South Carolina is a solidly red state, the investment from the Senate Leadership Fund, a major Republican super PAC, shows the party is worried about the race. President Trump won the state by 18 points in 2024, and Graham’s late brother, Sen. Lindsey Graham, won by 10 points in 2020, albeit against well-funded Democrat Jamie Harrison. Winning South Carolina has been a distant dream at best for Democrats since the late 20th century.
Axios first reported the $5 million investment.
South Carolina Republican Senate nominee Darrin Graham appointed to a seat In July, her brother, the late Senator Lindsey Graham, a close ally of Mr. Trump who had served in the Senate since 2003, died. Just weeks before his sudden death, Lindsey Graham had just won the primary for the seat, and Darrin Graham would go on to win the subsequent special primary and will be on the November ballot.
Mr. Trump campaigned vigorously Darin Graham, and used anti-transgender slurs to attack Andrews on social media.
“Anne ‘Transgender’ Andrews is running for South Carolina Senate against our wonderful Darin Graham,” Trump wrote on social media on Monday.
Andrews, a pediatrician, said she does not support gender reassignment surgery on minors, but she has spoken out in the past against a bill that would ban transgender athletes from participating in sports. She told The New York Times last week that she does not “support biological males participating in women’s sports.”
The most resonant campaign ads of 2024 have seized on transgender issues as emblematic of America’s cultural divide: “Kamala is theirs/theirs, President Trump is yours.” This year, some Republicans are trying to replicate the effort and tie their Democratic opponents to transgender issues, though it’s unclear whether it will be equally successful.
Andrews responded Monday night without directly mentioning Trump’s remarks but noted that “if you care more about your bills than the politics of Washington, this is the campaign for you.”
Republican former South Carolina Governor David Beasley told CBS News that Trump’s comments about Andrews were “a real disgrace.”
Beasley, a former executive director of the World Food Program, also called the post “abhorrent” on social media.
“Elections don’t have to be about cruelty and lies,” he wrote. “South Carolina deserves better. I urge voters to look at the merits of each candidate and vote accordingly. We must reject politics based on division and hatred”