Republican voters in South Carolina made political history on Tuesday with two nominations that broke with longstanding racial, cultural and gender trends.
Tim Scott was chosen overwhelmingly as the party’s candidate in the 1st District congressional race, and Nikki Haley became the party’s first female nominee for governor. Each is considered the favorite for November’s general election.
If Mr. Scott wins, he would be the first black Republican in the House of Representatives since Oklahoma’s J.C. Watts retired in 2003. The last black Republican representative from South Carolina was Robert Smalls of Beaufort, who left office in the 1880s.
Mrs. Haley would be the state’s first female governor and the country’s second Indian-American governor. A staunch conservative, state Rep. Haley beat Gresham Barrett handily. But on the road to winning, her gender and her ethnicity were issues.
Congratulations to South Carolina. Here in North Carolina, a black Republican was nominated for Congress in the 13th District. I don’t think his election outlook is as good as Mr. Scott’s, however.
Up here in Greenville, our 6 term Republican Congressman Bob Inglis lost 71%/29% to the Solicitor (District Attorney) in Spartanburg. He got fewer votes in the run off than he did in the regular primary. People,I believe, percieved Mr. Inglis was part of the problem rather than part of the solution. His congressional career has been totally lackluster. In actuality, Mr. Inglis probably lost the election last August at a town hall meeting when he announced the best thing people could do for America was to stop watching Glen Beck and Fox News.
The SC Dems are Greene with envy.
So much for Democratic sneers and stereotypes about southern Republicans as a bunch of racists and rednecks.
I note that while Nikki Haley may be the descendant of immigrants from India, she is said to be a “practicing Methodist.” Likewise, the governor of Louisiana, Bobby Jindal, the first Indian-American elected governor of any state, is also a Republican and a Christian (Roman Catholic). Elected in 2007, Mr. Jindal seems to be remaining popular with the voters there. I hope Mrs. Haley wins as expected in November.
David Handy+
I get so tired of the media obsessing about candidates’ sex, race, ethnicity, etc. None of those categories matter a hill of beans. The important thing is she is a conservative. That’s what counts, not whether she is a Republican or Democrat, black, white, brown, yellow, red, Catholic, Protestant, male, female, or other irrelevant category!