Annie Andrews wins South Carolina Democratic primary, targets Lindsey Graham

Annie Andrews emerged from South Carolina’s Democratic Senate primary with a clear task: make Lindsey Graham defend a record, a style and a political era that have helped keep him in office since 2003. Andrews, a Charleston pediatrician, won the nomination on June 9 and now faces the Republican senator in a state where Democrats have not won a U.S. Senate race since Fritz Hollings was reelected in 1998.

The contest begins with Graham still the strongest statewide brand in the race. He was elected to the Senate in 2002, took office in January 2003 and went on to win reelection in 2008, 2014 and 2020. His current term ends on January 3, 2027, and his 2020 victory over Democrat Jaime Harrison, by 10 percentage points, showed how hard it remains for Democrats to break through in South Carolina.

Andrews enters the general election with a profile designed to widen the fight beyond party loyalists. Her campaign has presented her as a pediatrician and mother focused on South Carolina families and children, and health care has been central to that message. A measles outbreak in South Carolina also became part of her pitch, sharpening the argument that she wants to make the race about what Graham has done, and not only about the partisan lean of the state.

That strategy runs into a familiar obstacle. South Carolina Republicans have continued a statewide winning streak, and Republican candidates in recent races have leaned heavily on their ties to Donald Trump, who remains popular in the state. Graham, one of South Carolina’s most recognizable political figures, has also benefited from staying power that few politicians can match. In the 2008 general election, he became the first person in state history to receive more than one million votes.

Andrews is not starting from scratch. She ran for Congress in South Carolina’s 1st District in 2022 and lost to Nancy Mace, giving her an earlier run at turning her medical background into a political argument. Now she is trying to turn that biography into a statewide case against a senator seeking a fifth term, with the battle likely to center on whether voters outside the Democratic base will be willing to hear it.