South Carolina Senate: Republicans write in challenger against Trump-backed pick

A group of South Carolina Republicans is urging voters to write in Congressman Ralph Norman for the US Senate instead of supporting party nominee Darline Graham. The effort, known as Write-In Ralph, aims to capitalize on dissatisfaction with Graham, who received the endorsement of President Donald Trump. Avery Milton, a 28-year-old native of the state and a former Trump voter, is helping lead the campaign. He described feeling betrayed by the president’s second-term actions, including the launch of a war with Iran, which contradicted Trump’s campaign promise to avoid new conflicts.

Graham secured the nomination after the sudden death of her brother, Senator Lindsey Graham, on July 11. Her appointment marked a historic first for a sibling filling a Senate vacancy. Trump urged her to run for a full six-year term shortly after her appointment, promising his complete endorsement. Graham defeated Norman in the August primary, but tensions between the two have remained high. Norman has declined to campaign alongside Graham since the primary loss, telling The Wall Street Journal that she had not earned the vote and that the campaign was focused on propping up a candidate.

The write-in strategy relies on voters manually entering Norman's name on the ballot, a method that rarely results in victory. The last successful example occurred in 2010 when Alaska’s Lisa Murkowski won the Senate seat after losing her party’s primary. In the 2022 South Carolina Senate race, write-in votes represented only 0.1 percent of the total. Milton argued that Graham has failed to connect with grassroots conservatives, particularly in Upstate South Carolina, where Norman holds strong support. He criticized the state’s Republican establishment for neglecting everyday voters in favor of private events and appearances with the president.

The race has drawn significant attention from President Trump, who has visited South Carolina twice in the last three months to campaign for Graham. This level of presidential involvement is notable given that Trump won the state by nearly 18 percentage points in the 2024 election. Polling data from October by the New York Times and Siena College indicates the contest is competitive. Graham and Democratic challenger Annie Andrews were tied at 48 percent among likely voters. The poll also found that 30 percent of likely voters identify as independents, a group where Andrews leads Graham by 20 percentage points.

Voter engagement in the state has reached record levels, with nearly 950,000 early votes cast according to the state’s Election Commission. John Connolly, a 77-year-old retiree in the Lowcountry, expressed skepticism toward Graham, describing her as a puppet who simply nods when told. Leila Ali, a regional campaign adviser, noted that strategists often underestimate the diversity of the Southern electorate. She highlighted that the Southern vote is not a monolith, a view supported by the high early turnout and the split among party members.

Milton and other supporters of the write-in campaign want a senator who thinks independently rather than acting as a rubber stamp for party leadership. They believe Norman is willing to consider all sides of an issue. Milton acknowledged the risk that writing in Norman could help the Democratic candidate win in a state that has not elected a Democrat to the Senate since 1998. He maintained that the blame for a potential loss should not fall on the write-in effort, arguing that their votes would not have automatically gone to Graham anyway.