MAGA Inc. spends $827K to back Darline Graham on final day of South Carolina GOP Senate runoff
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COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) -- The final day of South Carolina's Republican U.S. Senate runoff campaign on Monday came with a major cash infusion for Sen. Darline Graham from MAGA Inc., the super PAC that supports President Donald Trump and aligned Republicans but has spent little thus far on the president's midterm candidate picks.
The spend of nearly $830,000 came as Graham and Rep. Ralph Norman wrapped up their compressed campaigns to win South Carolina's GOP nomination in a special primary to replace the late Sen. Lindsey Graham on November ballots.
Tuesday's Senate runoff tests the heft of both a famous political last name and the endorsement of Trump, who is backing Darline Graham and campaigned in the state for her days ahead of the vote.
The matchup pits the well-known Norman -- fresh off an unsuccessful gubernatorial bid earlier this summer -- against Graham, the late senator's sister who was thrust into the political spotlight with her interim appointment, then a sprint of a primary campaign.
Graham drew early criticism for being in Washington, D.C., for Senate votes instead of on the ground in South Carolina, where many voters said they didn't know anything about her or her positions. She's been trying to make up that ground, holding meet and greet events, including two on Monday in Aiken and Seneca, as well as a news conference with Gov. Henry McMaster, who appointed her to the interim post and endorsed Graham on Friday.
Trump on Monday night also planned the second of two tele-rallies for Graham.
The president, long closely allied with Lindsey Graham, has done more to promote Darline Graham's candidacy than he has for others he's endorsed in this year's midterms. Trump encouraged her to run and traveled to South Carolina on Friday for a rally with Graham in Myrtle Beach.
Before several thousand people -- some of whom said they came mostly to see the president, not his chosen candidate -- Trump urged "every South Carolina patriot to go to the polls and vote for Darline Graham."
When McMaster appointed Graham last month, a person familiar with McMaster's thinking but unauthorized to speak publicly about it said the governor had never contemplated that she would run for the seat herself.
Asked Monday why he had waited until late last week to endorse Graham, McMaster said simply that "I thought that was the right time."