Democrat Annie Andrews has won South Carolina’s Senate seat, overturning a Republican stronghold and ending the party’s hold on the seat since 1998, according to projections.
Andrews defeated Republican incumbent Darline Graham, the younger sister of the late Lindsey Graham, in a historic upset for the Democratic Party.
“I think we just made some history,” Andrews told supporters on Tuesday night as the result became clear.
South Carolina Senate seat changes hands
Graham was appointed to complete her brother’s term after he died suddenly in July. She later secured the Republican nomination in a special primary runoff with the endorsement of US President Donald Trump.
However, Graham struggled to unite conservative voters behind her campaign. During a primary debate, she said she was “not that informed on national security” and that “national security is not my thing”.
Trump made several appearances with Graham during the final month of the campaign, an unusual level of presidential involvement in a state that Republicans normally win comfortably.
Andrews raised more than $22 million more than Graham, according to Federal Election Commission filings. Her campaign was funded largely by grassroots donations, and she pledged not to accept money from corporate political action committees.
She campaigned on reducing costs for working families, expanding affordable healthcare, protecting reproductive rights and opposing what she described as endless wars.
Andrews said Graham had called to congratulate her after the result. In her victory speech, she told supporters: “This Senate seat doesn’t belong to one family, one party, or to Washington, DC. It belongs to you and it always will.”
She added: “Nobody in Washington recruited me to run. Nobody handed me a seat in the United States Senate. And nobody wrote me a script. I owe no one in Washington anything.”
Medical students who attended the same medical school as Andrews celebrated at an election watch party. They also volunteer at a free clinic in Mount Pleasant serving uninsured people.
“Having a scientist in that space means a lot to us,” student Daniel Newlands said.
Lela Ali, a regional voting adviser in the South, said Andrews’s victory could have significance beyond South Carolina.
“I think this victory and the gains across the region today gives people across the South a renewed sense of possibility,” she said. “We can’t turn our backs on the South.”
