In a striking reversal, South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster on Thursday ordered the state legislature into special session to consider a bill that would gerrymander 17-term Democratic Rep. James Clyburn out of his congressional district.
The order, which acceded Thursday to President Donald Trump’s public demands for mid-decade redistricting, came just moments after the 2026 legislative session formally ended at 5:01 p.m. The order also was just 10 days after McMaster’s office confirmed that he would not call a special session to redraw the state’s congressional map, which already gives S.C. Republicans a 6-1 advantage in the state’s U.S. House delegation.
But with Trump continuing to demand action and a rising chorus of Republican party officials and social media influencers joining the push, McMaster informally told lawmakers late Wednesday to begin planning for the special session.
An unstated ‘bargain’?
Senate Majority Leader Shane Massey, who has emerged in recent days as the redistricting effort’s most outspoken Republican opponent, called the order a “flip flop.”
“The governor for the last eight or nine months has been just as determined and resolute on this issue as I’ve been,” Massey told reporters. “Heck, I talked to the guy four or five times last week and he was firm on it. Something happened earlier this week.”
Massey added, “I’ve heard the rumors, and I hope there’s no corrupt bargain in place. But something happened and it has been a complete 180 on this issue.”
And in a rare move, the Republican mayors of S.C.’s first and fourth largest cities, Charleston’s William Cogswell and Mount Pleasant’s Will Haynie, commented publicly on Statehouse business Thursday, saying they “have real concerns about what’s being proposed.”
“We believe in a government that serves its people, not the other way around,” the mayors said in a joint statement. “We would encourage members of the General Assembly to slow down, ask hard questions, and let principle guide them over politics.”
Still, other Republican leaders, including leading GOP candidates running in next month’s primary to replace the term-limited McMaster, lauded the governor’s action.
‘Political mayhem’
On the other side of the aisle, Democratic businessman and gubernatorial candidate Billy Webster said the push to redraw lines only 12 days before early primary voting is set to begin in the current districts “just makes no sense.”
“Obviously, what is happening here is completely at the behest and the demand of President Trump,” the former Clinton White House official said at a Thursday press conference. “Governors are supposed to govern their way through issues like this, not provoke political mayhem.”
Meanwhile, Charleston Democratic Rep. Spencer Wetmore, a member of the S.C. House committee tasked last week with producing a new map, was blunt in her assessment of the special session.
“It’s a rushed and rigged process to make rushed and rigged maps,” she told Statehouse Report Thursday.
But despite clear anger about the process, Democrats have made no secret of their view that carving up Clyburn’s 6th District would end up backfiring on Republicans by making Democrats competitive in at least three of the new districts — an outcome known as “dummymandering.”
Specifically, Democrats say, GOP candidates would enjoy only a three-point to six-point edge in the 1st, 2nd and 6th districts under the map that’s currently circulating among Republicans — a number that Democrats could potentially overcome in a good year.
That’s one of many objections Massey raised earlier in the week, when five Republican senators joined the chamber’s 12 Democrats in stopping an earlier House-led effort to create a special redistricting session.
S.C. Democratic Party Chair Christale Spain said Massey is right to be concerned, echoing his argument that more competitive districts would draw stronger Democratic candidates and that anger among Black voters over the process would drive higher turnout.
“He knows the population, he knows the demographics and he’s warning his party that they’re about to awaken a sleeping giant,” she said.
What to expect
While Statehouse leaders stressed that the schedule for the special session will remain fluid, House Majority Leader Davey Hiott, R-Pickens, laid out a rough timeline for reporters Wednesday night.
House members, he said, would return to the Capitol Friday morning to begin reviewing the recently introduced redistricting bill, which leaders hope to push through the chamber and over to the Senate no later than Wednesday. Over the weekend break, Hiott noted, the map room would be open for members to study the proposed new lines.
As a practical matter, he said, the House and Senate would have to finish their business before May 26, when early primary voting is set to begin under the existing lines.
“Two weeks is basically the timeline we’ve got to finish this bill,” Hiott said.
As for what to expect between now and then, he said he expected long days of tedium punctuated by periods of angry debate.
“It’ll be like nothing we’ve ever seen,” Hiott said. “It will be long. It will be boring. It will be confrontational. We’ve told our caucus members — please, please, please, respect has got to be there from everybody.”
In the upper chamber, where senators have made it clear they want a more deliberative process, possibly including public input, the calendar is less clear.
“I don’t know what’s going to happen once we get into it,” Massey told reporters Thursday.
But at least one Democratic member, Charleston Sen. Ed Sutton, said he knew exactly what to expect — and it wasn’t just redistricting.
Noting that special sessions called by the governor are free-for-alls in which any issue can be brought to the floor, he said that abortion foes, led by Sen. Richard Cash, R-Anderson, would fight throughout the session to bring their no-exceptions abortion ban up for a vote.
“I can guarantee Cash is going to bring up abortion,” Sutton said. “So you can count on that nonsense.”
The House gaveled into special session at 11 a.m. Friday.
- Jack O’Toole is Statehouse bureau chief for Statehouse Report and the Charleston City Paper.
- Have a comment? Send to: feedback@statehousereport.com
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