Governor says officials don’t know how or when money materialised in state coffers, what it’s for, or if it’s even real
To put it mildly, the South Carolina state government faces an unusual problem: what to do about $1.8bn found in a state bank account when no one knows how it got there, how it should be spent or even whether it really exists.
Discussing the problem, the Republican governor, Henry McMaster, made a play for political understatement of the year.
Continue reading...Disbarred attorney already serving life sentence without parole in South Carolina prison for killing his wife and son
For maybe the last time, the convicted murderer Alex Murdaugh – in a prison jumpsuit instead of the suit he used to wear – shuffled into a courtroom on Monday in South Carolina and received a prison sentence.
This time, it was for 40 years in federal court for financial crimes.
Continue reading...John Barnett was one of several people who raised alarm in 2019 about concerns of safety lapses at Boeing’s North Charleston plant
A former quality manager at Boeing who became a prominent whistleblower and raised concerns over the planemaker’s production line has been found dead.
John Barnett died on Saturday from what appeared to a self-inflicted gunshot wound, according to officials in Charleston, South Carolina.
In the US, you can call or text the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline on 988, chat on 988lifeline.org, or text HOME to 741741 to connect with a crisis counselor. In the UK and Ireland, Samaritans can be contacted on freephone 116 123, or email jo@samaritans.org or jo@samaritans.ie. In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is 13 11 14. Other international helplines can be found at befrienders.org
Continue reading...Exit polls show election denialism has become mainstream among Republicans despite studies finding no widespread fraud in 2020
More than 60% of South Carolina Republican primary voters said they don’t believe Joe Biden was legitimately elected, according to exit polls, the latest data point that underscores how election denialism has become a mainstream belief in the Republican party.
Eighty-seven percent of those who don’t believe the US president was legitimately elected supported Donald Trump, according to a CNN exit poll of South Carolina primary voters. Just 12% supported Nikki Haley. Among those who believe Biden legitimately won in 2020, the results were nearly flipped 81% supported Haley, while 19% supported the former president.
Continue reading...Result called for Trump almost immediately after polls close as former South Carolina governor suffers stinging home-state loss
Donald Trump defeated Nikki Haley in her home state of South Carolina, a stinging setback that narrows her vanishingly thin path to the nomination.
The Associated Press called the South Carolina primary for Trump right when polls closed at 7pm ET, in a clear indication of his large victory in Haley’s home state. Trump locked in approximately 60% of the vote, with Haley hovering at about 40%.
Continue reading...The Republican contender has exasperated her rival by not dropping out, but she believes not everyone in the party is enamored of Trump
Losing South Carolina is almost always a bad omen for presidential hopefuls and defeat in a candidate’s home state is viewed as irrevocable. But as the last Republican standing between Donald Trump and the Republican party nomination, Nikki Haley thrilled supporters on Saturday by deftly capitalizing on her small but consistent show of support from voters desperate for an alternative.
Trump was declared the winner within one minute of polls closing in the Palmetto State, an unsurprising but nevertheless stinging rebuke for Haley at the hands of the voters who twice elected her governor.
Continue reading...Voters resoundingly choose Donald Trump over the state’s former governor Nikki Haley – see the results in full
South Carolina’s Republican voters went to the polls on Saturday to choose a candidate for president, with two significant choices left: the state’s former governor, Nikki Haley, and former president Donald Trump.
Haley lost the New Hampshire primary last month by about 11 points, and polling suggested Trump would defeat his former ambassador to the United Nations by about 2-1 in her home state.
Continue reading...Former governor Nikki Haley urged supporters to turn out in large numbers as Donald Trump declared he’s ‘coming like a freight train’ in November
South Carolinians headed to the polls on Saturday to cast their ballots in the Republican presidential primary, as the state’s former governor, Nikki Haley, fights to hang on in a race still dominated by Donald Trump.
At her primary eve rally in Mount Pleasant, just outside of Charleston, Haley had called on her supporters to turn out in large numbers on Saturday.
When to expect South Carolina results
Key dates for the 2024 election
Haley’s steep odds in South Carolina
Continue reading...Republican candidate attacks Trump for being more concerned with himself than with country ahead of South Carolina primary
Nikki Haley pressed her case on Sunday to become the Republican presidential nominee by launching a sharp attack on her rival Donald Trump as a candidate who is set to spend more time in court than on the campaign trail this year and is intent on ranting about his own supposed victimhood rather than fighting for the American people.
With less than three weeks to go before the Republican primary in her home state of South Carolina, which many observers see as the former governor and UN ambassador’s last stand, Haley attacked Trump for being more concerned with himself than with the future of the country. She told CNN’s State of the Union Sunday morning TV show that his multiple court cases, in which he faces 91 charges across four criminal cases, amounted to a “real issue”.
Continue reading...President derided Trump after easily winning first primary contest for Democratic presidential nomination
President Joe Biden won his first official primary election in a season that has become increasingly predictable with each contest.
Biden and the Democratic National Committee had successfully lobbied to thwart tradition and designate South Carolina the first contest for the party’s presidential nomination instead of Iowa and New Hampshire. On Saturday, Biden handily won more than 95% of the vote in the state that had launched his campaign in 2020. Long-shot candidates Dean Phillips, a congressman from Minnesota, and Marianne Williamson, a self-help author, trailed far behind.
Continue reading...The president’s decisive victory in the first Democratic primary belies a difficult campaign ahead with various strikes against him
Surprise! Joe Biden won the Democratic presidential primary in South Carolina with a high-90s percentage that would make even Vladimir Putin or Kim Jong-un blush.
But despite the low energy and low turnout, there was a wider narrative on Saturday about representation, the changing face of the US and a rebuke to the white identity politics of Donald Trump.
Continue reading...This blog is now closed. You can read the full story and see the latest live results below:
In a statement released by his campaign, Joe Biden cast his victory in the South Carolina Democratic primary as an important step in defeating Donald Trump in the November presidential election:
In 2024, the people of South Carolina have spoken again and I have no doubt that you have set us on the path to winning the Presidency again – and making Donald Trump a loser – again.
When I was elected President, I said the days of the backbone of the Democratic Party being at the back of the line were over. That was a promise made and a promise kept. Now, you are First In The Nation.
Continue reading...The president easily swept past his opponents Dean Phillips and Marianne Williamson to gain the state’s nod for the nomination
President Joe Biden has again won the South Carolina presidential primary, his first formal primary win of the election season.
Amid low voter turnout, the Associated Press projected that Biden also won all 55 of the state’s Democratic delegates. Another seven delegates are pledged by party leaders and elected officials, such as South Carolina’s lone Democratic congressman, Jim Clyburn. Neither Dean Phillips, the congressman from Minnesota, nor author Marianne Williamson received at least 15% of the statewide vote or 15% of the vote in any congressional district, the threshold necessary to win delegates.
Continue reading...Follow live as the state’s Democratic voters choose their preferred candidate for the US elections
The South Carolina Democratic primary took place on 3 February, and was chosen by the Democratic National Committee as the first election contest in the 2024 election year. Joe Biden is the clear frontrunner in the primary and hopes to recapture the enthusiasm that launched his campaign in 2020.
The polls closed at 7pm.
Continue reading...State holds party’s first official primary under new schedule, with president polling at 70%
Joe Biden aims to build on recent momentum on Saturday, when South Carolina officially launches the race for the Democratic presidential nomination.
The US president received a boost last month when he won an unsanctioned primary election in New Hampshire without even appearing on the ballot. A grassroots write-in campaign ensured that he brushed aside his challengers Dean Phillips and Marianne Williamson.
Continue reading...Becky Hill, who Murdaugh’s lawyers accuse of jury-tampering, alleged to have plagiarized passages in memoir from BBC article
The court clerk who helped steer the murder trial of South Carolina’s Alex Murdaugh and has since been hit with accusations of jury-tampering – potentially leading to a retrial – is now embroiled in a plagiarism controversy.
Soon after the trial, in which Murdaugh was convicted of killing his wife and son near a dog kennel at their Low Country home, Becky Hill published a book named Behind the Doors of Justice: the Murdaugh Murders.
Continue reading...Up to 127mm of rain falls on Florida and gusty winds and flash flooding hit parts of Georgia and South Carolina
Last weekend, a low-pressure system that had developed over the Gulf of Mexico tracked north-east across the Florida peninsula. Lashings of heavy rain and strong winds were brought to Florida during the early hours of Sunday morning, dumping up to 127mm (5in) of rain on the state in its passing.
The low-pressure system, termed a “nor’easter”, continued to track north-east, strengthening and bringing gusty winds and flash flooding to the coastal parts of the south-east US, including Georgia and South Carolina.
Continue reading...Worden Butler and Alexis Hartnett charged after FBI search house in Horry county following alleged racially motivated campaign
The FBI has searched a house in South Carolina after a white couple allegedly put up a cross that faced their Black neighbors and set it on fire.
On Wednesday morning, federal agents searched the house of 28-year-old Worden Butler and 27-year-old Alexis Hartnett in Horry county for a “civil rights investigation involving allegations of racial discrimination”, WBTW reports the agency saying.
Continue reading...Deadly winter storm leaves hundreds of thousands without power and deposits flooding and freezing temperatures in its wake
At least six people were killed and hundreds of thousands were left without power as a deadly winter storm swept across the north-eastern US on Monday, depositing flooding and freezing temperatures in its wake.
Two of the deaths were in Maine in separate cases involving fallen trees, authorities said. Other deaths were reported in Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, South Carolina and New York.
Associated Press contributed reporting
Continue reading...Court hears redistricting case after lower court ruled Republicans had unlawfully moved 30,000 votes out of a congressional district
The supreme court’s conservative majority appeared skeptical on Wednesday that South Carolina Republicans discriminated against Black voters when it redrew one of the state’s congressional districts to make it friendlier to the GOP.
During two-hours of oral argument on Wednesday, the court’s conservative justices aggressively poked holes in a three-judge panel’s ruling earlier this year finding that Republicans had unlawfully moved around 30,000 Republican voters out of South Carolina’s first congressional district to make it more Republican. Chief Justice John Roberts, a key swing vote on the court, seemed unconvinced by the evidence the lower court had accepted, saying at one point the challengers were asking the court to embrace arguments that “would be breaking new ground in our voting rights jurisdprudence”.
Continue reading...