by DAVID PASCOE

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Republicans have a supermajority in South Carolina; yet, our state is more liberal than the purple states that border us. John Adams once said, “facts are stubborn things.” Well, the facts prove our State Republican leadership gets its playbook from the Democratic Party.

In 2024, I was one of the only elected officials to endorse conservative Republican JD Chaplin in his campaign against liberal Democrat Gerald Malloy, who blocked every single pro-law enforcement bill in the General Assembly.  Malloy was one of the most powerful lawyer-legislators in the state and teamed often with Republicans on the Judiciary Committee to stifle conservative legislation.  I met with Republicans in both Houses of the General Assembly and tried to rally them to support the REPUBLICAN nominee. They refused because they either feared Malloy and feared the lawyer-legislators in power who supported him.  In my endorsement of Chaplin, I stated that the two-party system in South Carolina is not R vs. D but those who strive to serve others vs. those who strive to serve themselves. Luckily, JD Chaplin beat Gerald Malloy without the help of any Republican leadership in the General Assembly.

In our state, we have witnessed the liberal Republican Party establishment demonize and attempt to defeat conservative fighters because they are members of the Freedom Caucus. They use political consultants (The Swamp Parasites) giving them offices on State House property to attack the Freedom Caucus, the very men and women who exemplify what it means to be a conservative and fight against corruption and cronyism. The leadership in the General Assembly would rather work with liberal Democrats than work together with their fellow Republicans.  But here is a coincidental fact – 30% of the General Assembly are lawyer-legislators; less than 10% of Freedom Caucus members are lawyer-legislators.

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Let me tell you the core reason we are a liberal state and why I have enemies: conservatives are not really in charge of South Carolina. The lawyer-legislator uniparty is.

Nearly 30% of the General Assembly are lawyers. They control all of the money, the judiciary, and the most important committees. That is not representative government. That’s a cartel. 

When lawyers gain unchecked political power, they do not just write laws. They shape the system to benefit themselves. They design rules that ordinary citizens cannot understand, navigate, or challenge. That is exactly what has happened in South Carolina.

For over 30 years, liberal Republicans have controlled the State House. Liberal control has given us a judicial system dominated by legislative insiders. We have judges effectively chosen by the same lawyers who practice before them. We have legislative privilege routinely abused to delay cases, rearrange court dockets, and keep powerful clients out of trouble.

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What we have is a uniparty. A trial lawyer uniparty. Republicans and Democrats alike who share two things in common: they are lawyers who benefit from controlling the courts, and they cannot stand me because I am about to stand in their way as Attorney General.  Their bank accounts cannot afford for me to win. 

I have seen this system up close. I spent decades as a prosecutor. I led the State House Corruption Probe that exposed a pay-to-play culture operating at the highest levels of government. That investigation did not make me popular in Columbia. It did, however, make something very clear. Corruption does not thrive in chaos. It thrives in systems designed to protect insiders and punish anyone who challenges them.

The most powerful examples of this system are the House and Senate Judiciary Committees. These Committees are where judicial reform and pro-life legislation go to die. It is where lawyer-legislators protect their influence. It is where bills that threaten legislative control of the courts quietly disappear. This is not about party labels. It is about power. Worst of all, it is often about using public service for personal profit.

Under this system, lawyer-legislators decide which judges are allowed to be considered. And then they walk into courtrooms across South Carolina expecting favorable treatment from the very judges whose careers they control. That is not separation of powers. That is consolidation of power.

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RELATED | BOUGHT AND PAID FOR

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Families lose. Crime victims lose. Small businesses lose. And public trust evaporates.

This system did not develop by accident. It was built deliberately, layer by layer, and it continues because too many elected officials tolerate it. I’ve spent the last five years calling it out, which is the reason self dealing RINOs will stop at nothing to take down my campaign for Attorney General. 

Bring. It. On.

The liberal Republicans aren’t winning this battle. As your next Attorney General, I will dismantle the lawyer-legislator uniparty for good, starting with Weston Newton’s stranglehold on this state. And more importantly, I will make it impossible for them to profit from their public service 

If South Carolina wants real reform, it has to start by breaking the trial lawyer uniparty’s grip on the judiciary. It has to restore balance. It has to put citizens back ahead of insiders. I did not spend my career prosecuting corruption to stay quiet now. This system can be fixed. But only if we are honest about who really runs it.

Join me in this fight and let’s crush corruption in South Carolina.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR…

David Pascoe is solicitor for South Carolina’s first judicial circuit, which includes Calhoun, Dorchester and Orangeburg counties. He is a Republican candidate for attorney general of the Palmetto State.

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