The South Carolina Statehouse grounds include the offices of several statewide elected officials. (Photo by STATEHOUSE CAROLINA/Special to the SC Daily Gazette)
COLUMBIA — With two months to go before candidates must file to be on this year’s ballots, the state Democratic Party made a plea.
“RUN FOR OFFICE in 2026,” reads the top of an email sent Jan. 7 from state Democratic Party Chairwoman Christale Spain.
Democrats have announced bids for just two of the seven elected constitutional offices on the ballot this November: governor and state superintendent of education. The party is still talking with potential candidates, Spain told the SC Daily Gazette.
In her email, she pointed to that week’s slim margin of victory for Republican Greg Ford in a special election for a state House seat representing Dorchester County. He defeated Democrat Sonja Ogletree Satani by just 21 votes, as determined by an automatic recount.
Ogletree Satani “ran one heck of a race,” Spain wrote, noting that President Donald Trump won the district by over 6 percentage points in 2024. (Statewide, he won by 18 points.) “The lesson to all of us is that we can compete and win if we run!”
The email was successful, Spain told the Gazette on Wednesday.
In one week, more than a hundred people filled out the candidate interest form attached to that email. “Dozens” of them checked a box showing interest in seeking a statewide office, according to Jon Burton, a party spokesperson.
It’s been 32 years since a Democrat competed for every statewide elected office in the South Carolina constitution. And back in 1994, there were two additional offices on the ballot.
The party has come close to having a candidate for every office since.
In 2006, a Democrat ran for every statewide office except attorney general. Then-Attorney General Henry McMaster ran unopposed for re-election that year.
In 2002, the only constitutional office without a Democrat running was adjutant general, the leader of the state’s military department. Maj. Gen. Stan Spears ran unopposed that year. He easily defeated a Democrat in 2006 for his fourth and final term before retiring. In 2014, voters approved taking that office off the ballot and making it a governor-appointed position.
Also in 2014, McMaster was the last lieutenant governor elected separately, as per a change voters approved two years earlier.
Asked about Spain’s email, state GOP Chairman Drew McKissick said Democrats’ problem “isn’t a lack of candidates.
“It’s that voters simply aren’t buying what they’re selling,” he said in a statement to the SC Daily Gazette.
A Democrat last won a statewide office in 2006, when Jim Rex was elected state superintendent of education by fewer than 500 votes.
This year, two Democrats, Lisa Ellis and Sylvia Wright, are running for the job overseeing the state agency for K-12 public schools. Whoever wins the June 9 Democratic primary will likely face Superintendent Ellen Weaver, who’s running for her second term. So far, no Republican has announced a challenge.
In 2022, the race for superintendent was the most crowded: Six Republicans and three Democrats ran to replace outgoing Superintendent Molly Spearman.
Ellis was a first-time candidate then. The 25-year veteran teacher of Richland 2 high schools, who in 2018 founded the online teachers’ group SC for Ed, won a three-way primary outright without needing a runoff, then lost to Weaver by 16 percentage points. In 2023, SC for Ed announced an indefinite pause to its lobbying efforts, four years after organizing a teachers’ rally at the Statehouse attended by an estimated 10,000 people.
SC GOP announces debate schedule for candidates for governor
Wright, who has two decades of classroom and administrative experience, resigned from her job last fall as a district coordinator for Dorchester 4 in order to campaign full-time.
Among all the statewide races on the ballot this year, the wide-open governor’s race has by far gotten the most attention.
It’s been 16 years since no incumbent ran for governor. Five Republicans and two Democrats have announced bids to replace Gov. Henry McMaster, who first ascended to the job nine years ago when then-Gov. Nikki Haley joined President Donald Trump’s first administration. So, when voters first elected McMaster to the job in 2018, he’d already been governor almost two years.
In South Carolina, governors are limited to two elected terms. Other constitutional offices have no term limitations.
Two other statewide offices that have gotten little attention are wide open for the first time in over two decades.
Agriculture Commissioner Hugh Weathers is not seeking a sixth full term. It’s been 16 years since a Democrat challenged him.
Voters first elected Weathers in 2006, two years after Gov. Mark Sanford appointed the Orangeburg County dairy farmer to the job following the indictment of Charlie Sharpe, who was eventually sentenced to two years in prison for taking a bribe to protect a cockfighting ring.
Weathers endorsed Republican Fred West to replace him, The State newspaper reported last March. West retired in 2023 after 24 years as an executive at the poultry processing company Amick Farms and his since become director of market development at the Department of Agriculture.
So far, West is the only candidate to announce a bid to lead the agency with duties that include promoting one of the state’s top industries, keeping the food supply safe, and — since 2024 — handling all inspections of places that sell food, such as restaurants and cafeterias.
The job of comptroller general is open for the first time in 28 years, when then-Sen. Jim Landers replaced the retiring Earle Morris Jr.
That 1998 election was also the last time a Democrat won the post as the state’s chief accountant. In 2002, Republican Richard Eckstrom ousted Landers and kept the job for 21 years. Eckstrom resigned in 2023 amid mounting pressure over his office’s $3.5 billion accounting error. (The error was strictly on paper. No money went missing. The office mistakenly double-counted some agencies’ revenue.)
McMaster made history in appointing his budget director, Brian Gaines, who by agreeing to run the office temporarily became South Carolina’s first Black constitutional officer since Reconstruction. Gaines said at the time he had no interest in running in 2026.
One Republican has announced a bid: Mike Burkhold, a Charleston County businessman who founded Equiscript, a health care technology company.
For two other statewide offices, Republicans are seeking re-election without any announced competition.
Secretary of State Mark Hammond, first elected in 2002, is seeking a seventh term leading the office that registers and helps regulate businesses and charities operating in South Carolina. (Unlike in other states, South Carolina’s secretary of state plays no role at all in overseeing elections.)
Treasurer Curtis Loftis, first elected in 2010, also came under fire recently for accounting problems. Senate investigations into the comptroller general’s office led to discovery of a $1.8 billion error in the treasurer’s office — also a blunder on paper that didn’t affect state revenues or the Legislature’s budgeting process. An outside accounting firm found that all but $200 million never existed. But senators were incensed, voting 33 to 8 last April to remove him. The House, however, never took up the case.
Amid a grilling from senators, Loftis initially pledged that he would not seek re-election in 2026. But he later reversed course and announced he’s seeking a fifth term. He maintains that he did nothing wrong.
No one has announced a challenge.
SC Daily Gazette Editor Seanna Adcox contributed to this report.
Prior to January 2023, decades-old state law set the salaries of six constitutional officers at $92,000. Only the governor’s salary topped $100,000.
But in 2021, the General Assembly passed a law directing the legislative panel that sets the salaries for state agency heads to also set the pay for statewide officers, with two exceptions. At Gov. Henry McMaster’s request, the salaries of the governor and lieutenant governor continue to be set by the 1994 law. The lieutenant governor, who’s considered a part-time employee, is still paid $46,500.
Changes approved by the Agency Head Salary Commission in November 2022 took effect two months later with the start of officers’ new terms. Here are the salaries of all seven elected constitutional offices:
