Another SC election is here. This is how The State can help you prepare to vote.
South Carolinians begin early voting on May 28, two weeks ahead of the June 11 primary, in races from county council to Congress that will affect voters and non-voters alike. These elected officials could impact the lives of residents, workers and visitors for generations.
Given that power, I set out last month as McClatchy’s South Carolina opinion editor to interview candidates in 25 races in Richland and Lexington counties, to share their views with you, to help with your voluminous research and to offer our endorsements.
The purpose isn’t to tell you what to think but to share what we think.
We will publish candidate Q&As on our digital platforms next week, and endorsements in print and online the following week, in races for Congress, the South Carolina House of Representatives, the state Senate, Richland and Lexington county councils and Lexington County sheriff.
Our focus is on contested races in The State’s readership area, but we won’t do interviews and make endorsements in every race. We will revisit our approach before the Nov. 5 general election when Democrats and Republicans duel each other and face third-party challengers, so please let me know what you think.
We are publishing our Q&As first so you can assess the candidates on your own. We’d like to thank them for their responsiveness, time and attention to detail during our fact-checking.
We sent out 56 surveys and received 53 replies, near total participation. Taneshia Horne in Richland County Council District 7 subsequently suspended her campaign because she does not live in the district; her name is still on the ballot but a vote for her would be wasted this year. That means only two candidates didn’t reply — state House of Representatives District 87 candidate J. Michael Beatty Jr. and District 88 Rep. R.J. May. May told me he had received the survey, but repeated followup voicemails and emails to both went unanswered. If either sends responses before the election, we’ll edit and share them, too.
I often say, “Journalism costs money. Less journalism costs society.” Your subscriptions and support make an important, ambitious effort like this possible, so let me also thank you for reading our work. I hope you value our transparency, and that the Q&As and endorsements help you with such a sacred, long-held American tradition, electing the people to represent us.
Why do we do this? Vetting candidates for public office is one of the most important aspects of opinion journalism. Voters are busy, parsing claims — and fairly describing complex issues — is hard, and we enjoy a level of access to candidates and elected officials that most voters do not have. It would be a dereliction of duty not to share what we learn from and about these candidates.
It’s not our job to pick winners or to lobby for a particular candidate or political party, and we don’t expect you to follow our recommendations blindly. Our goal is to share research to help you decide for yourselves whether and which candidates are up to the challenge.
As the two local opinion team members at The State, letters editor and longtime South Carolina journalist Allison Askins and I will make the endorsements in consultation with The State President and Editor Brian Tolley. We’ll base them on interviews, research and each person’s achievements, background, character, demeanor and experience.
We’ll consider how a candidates’ values represent their voting constituencies, especially in primary races, and sometimes consider the makeup of the larger body the candidates want to join. We generally don’t want any government body to have such a majority that any minority is too muted.
Ultimately, we hope that you vote for the people you believe are best suited to represent the public. We do this work for you because we believe that voting is a shared responsibility but that it is everyone’s individual choice.
Send emails, 200-word letters to the editor or 650-word guest essays to me at mhall@thestate.com and say hi on X at @bymatthewthall anytime.
