One of the Republicans’ biggest and most avoidable midterm disasters offers an incredibly important lesson for President Trump and his allies.
On November 3, 2026, Democrat Annie Andrews defeated Sen. Darline Graham in the South Carolina U.S. Senate race by nearly five points. In 2024, for reference, Donald Trump won South Carolina by 18 percentage points. That marks a D+23 shift from 2024, raising questions about Darline Graham’s campaign and this stunning defeat. Graham lost because of her lack of experience, underperformance in historically Republican strongholds in upstate South Carolina, and low Republican turnout that paired with a blue wave.
On July 11, 2026, Republican incumbent South Carolina Lindsey Graham unexpectedly passed away. Darline Graham, his younger sister, was appointed to fill out the rest of his term. According to The Wall Street Journal, President Trump convinced her to run for a full six-year term, something she had not previously considered. The WSJ adds that some Senate Republican strategists had grown privately alarmed about the race, with several claiming they “could’ve found a better candidate, but the President wanted Graham”. The New York Times reported that she “struggled mightily to raise money” and suffered from gaffes such as saying she was “not that informed on national security” during a televised debate in the summer.
Darline Graham also suffered from a bitter primary which fractured the usual Republican coalition in South Carolina. Backed by President Trump, she ran against Reps. Ralph Norman and Russell Fry, among others. The race entered a runoff between Norman, who is from upstate South Carolina, and Graham. Norman’s upstate region is the historical conservative stronghold in the state. It is also home to many white evangelical Christians who support Republicans up and down the ticket.
Darline Graham won the runoff with 52.4% of the vote to Ralph Norman’s 47.6%, but the former lost in almost every upstate county. The major upstate Republican areas in Greenville, Spartanburg, and York counties broke for Norman by 35, 30, and 27 points, respectively. Such margins in upstate South Carolina helped tighten the race significantly but ultimately could not prevent Graham from winning the runoff. She won the rest of the state, including a similarly large margin in historically conservative Horry County, home to Myrtle Beach. After the primary, NBC News reported that Norman endorsed Darline Graham, saying that “defeating the Democrats and protecting our conservative values” remains the priority, but The Hill reported that Norman’s son, Warren Norman, was leaning toward voting for Democrat Annie Andrews in the general election. This internal Republican division allowed the race to tighten after the primary.
In the general election in November, Graham underperformed in these counties again, due to low turnout and a hostile upstate electorate. Graham lost to Annie Andrews by roughly 91,815 votes, which translated to a lean margin of 4.3 percentage points. Analyzing the upstate South Carolina results reveals how Graham lost. Of the counties won by Ralph Norman in the Republican primary, only Greenville County surpassed 80% of the 2024 presidential election turnout. Andrews won Greenville County, a constituency Donald Trump won by 22 points. Most of Norman’s strongholds landed around the lower end of turnout in the state relative to 2024. They were also unusually competitive.
Graham lost Norman’s home York County by a slim margin, revealing the true impact of the GOP primary on the general election. The Republican candidate for governor Alan Wilson, who went on to win his race, carried the county by five points. Ticket splitting was most common in upstate counties, with Wilson outpacing Graham in the Greenville area by double digits. Voters in upstate counties were willing to show up to the polls (even though turnout did dip), but these voters could not muster the strength to vote for Graham. Losing several counties in South Carolina’s conservative heartland hurt her statewide totals, and the slim margins she won by elsewhere netted her less votes than what was needed to win.
However, it is also important to consider the national “blue wave” which swept the country during the 2026 midterm elections, a consequence of an unpopular Republican administration. According to CNN, the generic ballot, a way of gauging who people would vote for regardless of candidates, had Democrats leading Republicans by 9 points, 52-43. That alone would cut President Trump’s 2024 margin in the state in half. In South Carolina, Black voters are an ever-important electorate. The exit polls from NBC show that Black voters nationwide broke for Democrats by a whopping 81 points. Black voters account for a noticeable percentage of voters in many South Carolina counties, including some of its most populous metro areas.
Turnout in populous Democratic strongholds was also vital to Andrews’ victory. In Richland County, home to Columbia, Black voters make up around half of the voter rolls.Voter turnout in Richland County sat at around 88% of 2024 levels, which is considerably higher than that of the Republican upstate. Plus, Richland County shifted nearly 20 points to the left this cycle. This left Annie Andrews with a tremendous 53-point lead in the county, a difference of roughly 86,000 votes. Andrews won statewide by only 91,000 votes, highlighting the importance of turnout in Richland County.
However, Annie Andrews did not require a majority-Black electorate to secure victories in populous counties. In Charleston County, Black residents make up less than 20% of registrants, but turnout stayed at 82% of 2024 levels. Most importantly, Charleston shifted from being a lean, D+6 county in 2024 to a safe D+27 county in 2026, another 20-point shift in a large county, netting Andrews around 45,000 votes. These populous county shifts suggest Andrews’ victory came from better turnout in her strongholds than the divided evangelical upstate, which was fueled by a national swing towards the Democratic Party.
Overall, Darline Graham suffered from inexperience, a bitter primary which siphoned her winning coalition’s voter base, and a national blue wave which boosted turnout and engagement in South Carolina’s most Democratic strongholds. However, this upset defeat for Republicans was avoidable. President Trump convinced Graham to run, threw the power of his endorsement behind her, and carried her through a primary that pushed away the core Republican base in the state. If Trump had not gotten involved, Ralph Norman would have had a much better chance of winning statewide with his upstate-based coalition. After the primary runoff, Norman noted that it was “shocking” to see Trump get involved in a South Carolina primary. The WSJ reported that Andrews had picked up endorsements from some of the state’s prominent Republicans, revealing Graham’s weakness as a candidate. From Graham skipping events that left voters unfamiliar with her candidacy to low conservative support and fundraising troubles, Republicans created a nightmare in a reliably Republican state by propping up Darline Graham. And it cost them the seat.
