Darline Graham

COLUMBIA — Under a barrage of negative press bound to get worse and a debate with U.S. Sen. Darline Graham only days away, Democratic Senate candidate Annie Andrews chose to face voters directly.

For more than a month, Andrews — better funded than Graham, and with more money to spend after a comparatively milder primary election — had clean airwaves to take her case to South Carolina voters.

It was an attempt to define her opponent early, but also an opportunity for Andrews to reintroduce herself as a rebranded moderate much different than the one-time progressive challenger to U.S. Congresswoman Nancy Mace just four years earlier.

Then, the cavalry arrived.

Attacks on Andrews

An article in the conservative National Review outlining her previous public positions supportive of transgender youth was published, rehashing her previously stated positions protective of gender-affirming care and opposed to restrictions on transgender athletes. President Donald Trump attacked Andrews in a social media post, describing her with an anti-transgender slur in an endorsement of Graham.

And money was coming to get the word out.

The GOP-aligned Senate Leadership Fund — facing a rapidly shrinking map against insurgent Democratic candidates — had already pledged some $5 million in spending boosting Graham, and was planning more to come: as Senate Majority Leader John Thune prepared to campaign for Graham in Charleston Oct. 9, news broke the group had moved some $2 million away from troubled Georgia Senate candidate Mike Collins to boost Graham’s prospects instead.

One source told The Post and Courier more could be coming, with estimates Senate Leadership Fund spending could reach as much as $10 million in South Carolina heading into the Nov. 3 election. A spokesperson for the PAC called claims of additional transfers away from Collins “totally false” in a text message to The Post and Courier.

It was a stunning shift in strategy for the GOP: a sign of resignation their hopes of gaining U.S. Senate seats had shifted to a defensive posture.

But it was also a bellwether of hard times ahead for Andrews, and the potential erosion of her brand with the moderates and Republicans she needed to win over to have any hope of flipping the seat.

So she took to television.

In an advertisement released Oct. 8, Andrews — appearing in a white doctor’s coat — faced voters directly in a 30-second ad spot addressing that record, denying the positions Graham’s campaign claimed she’d taken.

“Politics can get pretty ugly,” starts Andrews. “And when it does, you deserve to hear the truth.”

“My career as a pediatrician has always been about taking care of kids,” she continued. “I've got three of my own. So I want you to hear me loud and clear: I don't support biological men playing women's sports, and I don't support — and haven't ever performed — gender surgery for minors.”

“Darline Graham lying about me won't do a thing to help you,” she concludes.

It’s true: She’d never performed a gender surgery on a minor, because doing so is illegal in South Carolina. But she had repeatedly advocated for access to gender-affirming care for minors, highlighting the high rates of mental health issues and suicide that face the children who don’t receive it.

She had also in the past criticized statehouse legislation restricting transgender athletes from participating in women’s sports as “harmful” and “dangerous” toward the state’s transgender community, which advocates estimate at less than a half-percent of the state’s population.

"The point we're trying to draw — and Darline says it on the stump all the time — is that Annie paints herself as something that her own words contradict from just a few years ago," T.W. Arrighi, a Graham spokesperson, said of Andrews. "She lost her job at MUSC because of the positions she took on transgender treatments, then she becomes an activist and politician, and she's been trying to run for office since she ran against Nancy Mace. She got her butt kicked then because of this stuff, and now she's trying to moderate herself. Only problem is, it’s a lie.

"She doesn't have an answer for it," he added. "She didn't against Nancy Mace. She doesn't now."

Republican assistance

The attacks came as Andrews appeared to have been surging and preparing to engage the more conservative voters she would likely need in order to earn a winning majority in November.

As polls showed Andrews in a surprisingly tight race with Graham and near-double-digit percentages of voters undecided, Andrews had been engaged in extensive outreach to Republicans with appearances on conservative talk shows and in rural parts of the state.

In a podcast appearance with The New Republic’s Greg Sargent, Jalisa Washington-Price — a South Carolina strategist running Andrews-aligned political action committee Fresh Start — said they were working to build a permission structure for Republicans to vote Democratic, stating on the podcast they had gathered testimonials from lifelong Republicans she claimed were “breaking away from the party and voting for Annie Andrews,” including former Aiken County Council member Scott Singer.

Others are disenchanted as well.

One of those is Warren Norman, the son of Rock Hill congressman and former Graham opponent Ralph Norman, who was defeated in the Republican runoff election after heavy involvement from Trump.

Norman said in an interview that he’d never voted for a Democrat, but had grown frustrated with the Graham campaign's approach toward his father during the primary campaign, lobbing attacks he felt were inaccurate in order to get ahead in the race.

He said he sees a similar issue at play in the current race for U.S. Senate, where he says he believes Graham's campaign had inaccurately portrayed Andrews' positions on issues like gender-affirming care for transgender youth. But he also sees a lack of sufficient reason to back Graham, telling The Post and Courier he believed the South Carolina Republican Party to be “fractured,” with no real conservative candidate to choose from.