Flags provide a backdrop news conference held on the first floor of the Statehouse in Columbia, South Carolina, on Monday, Jan. 13, 2025. (File photo by Travis Bell/STATEHOUSE CAROLINA/Special to the SC Daily Gazette)
COLUMBIA — The state Republican Party scrambled Friday to shore up participation in its first debate for candidates hoping to be sworn in as governor next year.
As of Friday morning, just one of the six GOP candidates appeared to be a solid yes for the April 1 debate at the Newberry Opera House: Attorney General Alan Wilson, who committed last month to all of the party-organized debates ahead of an intra-party public spat.
Hours later, U.S. Rep. Ralph Norman of Rock Hill re-committed, and state Sen. Josh Kimbrell of Spartanburg County confirmed his attendance, guaranteeing a debate with at least half the gubernatorial field.
Isle of Palms businessman Rom Reddy said “no” to next week’s debate, citing a scheduling conflict, but pledged to participate in the party’s future debates. At least two more are scheduled. There will be a fourth debate in the likely event of a primary runoff.
That followed the state party announcing it had ditched its fundraising and polling qualifications for participation and sent a formal invitation to all six. Its only remaining qualifier was signing an agreement to the party’s debate rules. Wilson, Norman, and Kimbrell did so, the party said in a 2:30 p.m. news release.
Two other candidates remain questionable, five days ahead of the debate in the first wide-open race for governor in 16 years.
State GOP Chairman Drew McKissick repeated his request for participation. He likened not participating to disrespecting voters.
“Every candidate who wants to be our Party’s nominee for Governor owes Republican Primary voters the respect of participating in as many of these debates as possible,” he said in the release.
Norman committed earlier this month but — with only him and Wilson pledged to be on stage — he sent out a release earlier this week putting his attendance in question.
“All candidates should debate, but a debate between two candidates should wait until the runoff,” he said in a campaign release Wednesday. “If another candidate wants to join Alan and me, I’ll gladly see y’all in Newberry next week.”
Kimbrell wanted to participate. On Friday morning, he told the SC Daily Gazette he planned to be there, though it was unclear if he’d met the party’s qualifications of raising at least $100,000 from at least 250 unique donors contributing at least $50 each.
He told the Gazette he was above that threshold, though he did not share how much money he has raised. The party’s waiving of those requirements made fundraising questions moot, and he and Norman became a confirmed “yes.”
“Ralph looks forward to the debate,” spokesperson Brittany Yanick told the Gazette. “Too bad Pamela Evette won’t be there to defend her liberal record.”
On Thursday, Lt. Gov. Pamela Evette said she doesn’t see herself going because it would be too expensive to bring as many volunteers as she’d like.
“I felt very strongly about the fact it seemed like they were gonna be boxed out unless we as a campaign would have to pay $20,000 to get in there,” she told reporters as she officially filed to run.
A spokesperson for U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace has not yet responded to the Gazette’s request for comment and whether she plans to participate.
Several of Evette’s campaign consultants in February began blasting the state GOP for its ticket prices for the debates, calling them a “shakedown.”
According to debate guidelines shared with the SC Daily Gazette by the state party, candidates can attend and bring up to five family members and up to four staff to each debate for free. To bring additional guests, they could purchase a sponsorship package, which would range, per debate, from $2,500 for eight tickets, to $20,000 for 50 tickets.
Debate tickets are also available to paying members of the party’s Silver Elephant Club, which costs $30 per month, or members of its costlier gold, chairman’s, and platinum elephant clubs, the most expensive of which costs $120 per month. Those members don’t have to pay for a ticket, party executive director Leighton Gray Smith told the SC Daily Gazette. They only need to RSVP.
Smith expects a sold-out crowd at the 401-seat Newberry Opera House. Tickets were almost gone Friday, she said.
Last month, Norman and a social media account run by U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace’s staff, called the Mace War Room, both initially joined Evette in criticizing debate ticket prices and highlighting the most expensive ticket option of $20,000 for 50 tickets.
But by March 11, Norman had agreed to participate in the entire debate series, according to a party release.
This past week, Mace bashed the party’s debates for a different reason, criticizing the scheduling of the April 21 debate at the College of Charleston. That Tuesday conflicts with U.S. House votes, she wrote.
“Tell me the establishment isn’t trying to rig the debates without telling me the establishment isn’t rigging the debates,” she posted to X Wednesday. The party announced the timing of that debate in December.
The third debate will be May 26 at Wofford College in Spartanburg. A fourth debate, in the likely event of a runoff, is scheduled for June 16 at Coastal Carolina University in Conway.
From the start of the ticket price debacle, Wilson took a different tone.
“No one is requiring candidates to pay any money, let alone $20,000, to debate,” he said in a Feb. 27 news release that bashed Evette as “dodging debates.”
“She knows that, and her team knows that,” Wilson said of Evette. Norman repeated the “dodging debates” attack line against Evette in a March 25 news release.
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The party’s previous fundraising requirements for qualifying made Kimbrell questionable and impossible for Reddy.
Kimbrell’s most recent fundraising report showed he’d raised $41,000 by Dec. 31.
That compares to $2.1 million raised by Evette, $1.8 million by Wilson, $1.6 million by Mace, and $1.3 million by Norman, according to the last quarterly filings.
Reddy, who just jumped into the race last week, has pledged not to take any donations, which meant he needed an exception to qualify.
On Friday afternoon, Reddy’s campaign thanked the SC GOP for deleting the fundraising rule as he requested to be able to participate.
The party also scrapped polling qualifiers for candidates.
Ahead of scrapping those rules, McKissick suggested candidates just didn’t want to debate.
“Sometimes campaigns decide that it’s in their best interest to avoid high-visibility debates with other candidates, but it’s certainly not what’s best for Republicans who want to compare the candidates as they consider who to support,” he said.
Three Democrats are seeking that party’s nomination for governor: Charleston attorney Mullins McLeod and state Rep. Jermaine Johnson of rural Richland County announced their bids last year. Upstate businessman Billy Webster, chief of staff to Gov. Dick Riley and co-founder of Advance America payday lending, joined the race this week.
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Courtesy of South Carolina Daily Gazette
