South Carolina Senate race hits dead heat as Democrat ties Trump-backed incumbent

South Carolina has not sent a Democrat to the U.S. Senate since 1998. Donald Trump carried the state by nearly 18 points in 2024. And yet, with Election Day less than a week away, a new New York Times/Siena poll shows Democrat Annie Andrews and Republican incumbent Darline Graham deadlocked at 48 percent each among likely voters — a statistical tie that has forced both parties to spend in a state neither expected to be competitive.

The race took its unusual shape in July, when four-term Senator Lindsey Graham died and Republican Governor Henry McMaster appointed his sister, Darline Graham, to serve the remainder of his term. At President Trump's urging, she then entered the race for a full term — her first run for elected office at any level. She defeated U.S. Rep. Ralph Norman in the Republican primary, aided by Trump's political operation.

Graham's lack of political experience has become the defining vulnerability of her campaign. During a televised debate in August, she acknowledged she was 'not that informed on national security' when pressed on U.S. policy toward Taiwan. The NYT/Siena poll found that 51 percent of South Carolina voters — including 18 percent of Republicans — believe she does not have the right experience to be an effective senator. Andrews, by contrast, was seen as having the right experience by 54 percent of voters, a group that included 22 percent of Republicans.

Even if I don't agree with everything she says, at least I feel like she actually cares or means what she says or has her own take on things.— Douglas Stewart, 35-year-old Republican voter, Columbia, S.C.

Stewart said he plans to cross party lines and vote for Andrews. He is not alone: the poll found Andrews peeling away some Republican voters, and she leads Graham among independents by 57 percent to 37 percent. On the economy, more voters said Andrews would do the better job, and she also held narrow edges on cost of living and foreign wars.

Andrews, a pediatrician from Charleston, has built her campaign around her medical career, advocating for a public option and cheaper prescription drugs. Crucially, she has kept deliberate distance from the national Democratic Party's left flank — she does not support Medicare for All, has conceded that Democrats failed on the border, and declined to name a national Democrat she would want campaigning alongside her. The poll found that the top reasons her supporters gave for backing her were positive views of her policies or character, while the primary reason Graham's supporters cited was simply backing the Republican Party.

Graham, for her part, has leaned heavily on Trump. Her positions include opposing abortion rights and expressing complete trust in Trump on tariffs and the war with Iran; she has also called for the immediate deportation of anyone in the country illegally. Trump traveled to South Carolina for a rally last week and came back Thursday, where he told the crowd that Graham was running 'to save you from a radical left lunatic' and charged that Andrews supported 'child sexual mutilation' at taxpayers' expense — a characterization that conflicts with Andrews' own statements.

Graham does hold one meaningful advantage: name recognition. With the election approaching, roughly a quarter of voters said they were unfamiliar with Andrews or had no opinion of her — a share far greater than those who said the same of Graham, whose brother had served four well-known terms in the Senate before his death.

I think she's going to pick up on her brother Lindsey's positions.— Donnie Phillips, 76, Republican voter, Little River, S.C.

Senate Majority PAC, the Senate Democrats' main political action committee in the midterms, is spending on digital ads in South Carolina — the first time Senate Democrats have bought ads in the state. Republicans are also spending heavily despite their longstanding dominance, and the party's establishment is not entirely united: Ralph Norman, the congressman Graham defeated in the primary runoff, has said he will not campaign for her.

The NYT/Siena poll is not alone in showing a tight race, though it is the most favorable for Andrews. According to a South Carolina Policy Council survey taken this month, Graham led by a single point, a margin within the poll's error range. That same Policy Council survey highlighted how far Andrews has been running ahead of her party: Democratic gubernatorial nominee Jermaine Johnson trailed Republican Alan Wilson by 10 points.

The South Carolina contest is part of a broader Senate map that has grown unusually wide in the final days of the midterm campaign. New NYT/Siena polling also showed Republicans ahead by six points in Florida's Senate race and Democrats leading by 14 points in Minnesota — but South Carolina, according to those polls, has moved to the map's center as Republicans have been forced to defend more seats in redder states than expected.

Why it matters — If Andrews wins, it would be the first Democratic Senate victory in South Carolina in nearly three decades and could shift control of the Senate — making a race almost no one expected to be competitive one of the most consequential on the map.

Sources differ on Current polling leader in South Carolina Senate race: Tied at 48%-48% (tossup) (dnyuz.com / abcnews4.com / theguardian.com) vs Graham leads by one point (within margin of error) (yahoo.com / theguardian.com (citing SC Policy Council poll)) vs Graham leads by four points (270towin.com (citing ECU and Citadel polls))

Reported by theguardian.com, thehill.com, abcnews4.com, yahoo.com, dnyuz.com, 270towin.com, postandcourier.com