South Carolina voters are heading to the polls Tuesday for a primary runoff election that will settle several key nominations, most notably the Republican race for governor.
The two candidates facing off in the GOP gubernatorial runoff are two-term Lt. Gov. Pamela Evette and state Attorney General Alan Wilson, who is the son of Republican U.S. Rep. Joe Wilson. In a surprise move, President Donald Trump announced Friday that he is endorsing both candidates ahead of the runoff contest.
“I can’t hurt one of them by only Endorsing the other,” Trump wrote in a Friday evening social media post. Trump had previously backed Evette during the June 9 primary, when she and Wilson were among six candidates competing for the nomination.
Trump’s endorsements have generally translated into strong performances at the polls in 2026, though recent results suggest his backing no longer guarantees a win. His picks for governor in Iowa and Georgia both lost their nomination races, and his choice for Oklahoma governor was pushed into a runoff after finishing second in the June 16 primary.
Evette entered the runoff with a narrow lead after receiving 28.9% of the primary vote, compared to 26.1% for Wilson. U.S. Rep. Ralph Norman finished third with 17.1%.
Evette performed best in the Pee Dee region in the northeastern part of the state, near the North Carolina border and the Atlantic coast — an area that strongly backed Trump in 2024 and represented roughly 15% of the primary vote. Wilson’s strongest support came from the central part of the state, which includes Richland County, home to the state capital of Columbia, and extends southwest to the Georgia border, encompassing several majority Black counties. That region accounted for about 19% of the primary vote and was more evenly split between Trump and Democrat Kamala Harris in 2024.
The Upcountry region — which includes some of the state’s most populated counties such as Greenville, Spartanburg, and Anderson — is expected to be a major battleground in the runoff. Evette led in that area during the primary, though her margin over third-place finisher Norman was less than 2 percentage points.
Whoever wins the Republican nomination will go on to face Democratic state Rep. Jermaine Johnson in November. Johnson secured the Democratic nomination outright in the primary. Democrats have not won the South Carolina governorship since 1998.
The next governor will take over from term-limited Republican Gov. Henry McMaster, who has endorsed Evette. The new governor is also expected to play a significant role in the early stages of the 2028 presidential race, as South Carolina is anticipated to again hold first-in-the-South presidential primaries.
Also on the ballot Tuesday are runoff races in the 1st Congressional District, the seat previously held by U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace. Mace, a former Trump ally who drew the president’s ire after calling for the release of the Jeffrey Epstein files, finished a distant fifth in the gubernatorial primary. Both the Republican and Democratic primaries to fill her former seat resulted in runoffs.
In the Republican runoff for that seat, Charleston County Councilwoman Jenny Costa Honeycutt faces state Rep. Mark Smith. Honeycutt led Smith by 4 percentage points in the primary. On the Democratic side, former Hilton Head Island general counsel and U.S. Coast Guard veteran Mac Deford faces retired Navy Vice Admiral and former Navy Reserve Chief Nancy Lacore. Lacore outpaced Deford by nearly 8 points in the primary. Trump carried the 1st Congressional District in 2024 with about 56% of the vote, compared to roughly 43% for Harris.
Polls in South Carolina close at 7 p.m. ET. Results are expected to begin coming in around 7:20 p.m., based on the timeline from the June 9 primary, when nearly all vote totals were counted by 12:19 a.m.
As of Saturday, South Carolina had approximately 3.4 million registered voters. Voters in the state do not register by party. About 473,000 people cast ballots in the June 9 Republican gubernatorial primary.
Voters who participated in a partisan primary on June 9 are only eligible to vote in the runoff of the same party. Registered voters who sat out the June 9 primary may vote in either party’s runoff on Tuesday.
Turnout in runoff elections typically drops compared to the original primary. In the last Republican gubernatorial runoff in 2018, turnout fell about 7% from the primary. The drop-off was roughly 14% in the 2010 Republican gubernatorial runoff. Statewide runoffs in 2022 saw even steeper declines, with Republican runoff turnout for state school superintendent falling 47% and Democratic U.S. Senate runoff turnout dropping 74%.
About 37,000 ballots had already been cast as of Wednesday, the midpoint of the state’s two-day early voting period. Nearly all of South Carolina’s 46 counties report early in-person and mail ballot results in the first vote update of the night, typically before releasing Election Day totals.
If the margin between the top two finishers is 1% or less of total votes cast, a recount is automatically triggered under South Carolina law. Tuesday’s runoff falls 133 days before the 2026 midterm elections.
