MAY 21, 2026 | There are moments in public life when the noise of partisan politics drowns out something that every voter understands and respects: that a democracy only works when the people’s voice is protected.
What is unfolding right now in South Carolina and other states across the country with the effort to redraw congressional district lines is one of those noisy moments. And the people of this state deserve to hear plainly that this is not acceptable.
Leaders come and go, but the process by which they are selected is sacred in our democracy and should never be exploited for short-term political gain. The current fight in the legislature cannot be about U.S. Rep. Jim Clyburn or President Donald Trump but respecting the peoples’ voice.
Reapportionment is not a new concept in American democracy. It has a long history, a defined process and clear standards that exist for good reasons. Communities must be respected. Geographic integrity must be maintained. And above all, the voting rights of citizens must be protected. That process has served this country well when it has been followed faithfully. When it has been twisted into a tool of partisan advantage, it has damaged public trust and left communities without the representation they are owed.
What is being proposed in our state is not reapportionment done in good faith. It is designed to game the system – to engineer an outcome that serves those in power rather than the citizens who put them there. That distinction matters enormously. The question is simple: are these lines being drawn to serve the people or to entrench the powerful? The answer, in this case, is not hard to see.
Congressman Jim Clyburn has spent his career in public service fighting for the people of South Carolina who have too often been left behind – working families, rural communities and Black South Carolinians whose political representation was denied for far too long in this state. He is one of the most consequential figures this state has produced, respected on both sides of the aisle. Jim Clyburn doesn’t own that House seat but deserves a fair chance to make his case to the people for re-election without a predetermined, gerrymandered electorate.
South Carolina has faced these crossroads before. When I called for the Confederate battle flag to come down from the Statehouse dome, it was not a popular decision. The political costs were real. But ultimately the people of South Carolina and their elected representatives recognized that some decisions are bigger than the next election. Equal dignity and equal representation are not partisan issues. They are foundational ones, endowed by our Creator, and they are worth losing office over. I can say that from firsthand experience. The South Carolinians who rallied behind the decision to bring our communities together, Black and White alike, made our State better.
The same test is now before South Carolina’s leaders. The question is not whether taking the right stand will be costly. It very well may be. The question is whether they are willing to do what is right for the people or what is politically expedient for their party.
The people of South Carolina are not sitting around waiting for their elected officials to draw the perfect district map. They are worried about paying their bills, about whether their children’s schools are preparing them for a changing economy, about access to health care and about the security of jobs in their communities. Those are the fights worth having. Those are the issues that should consume the attention and energy of anyone who holds public office. A protracted partisan battle over redistricting is a failure of the most basic responsibility of governance.
This is not a South Carolina problem alone. It is already spreading across the country. State after state has watched partisan leaders redraw maps not to reflect their communities, but to entrench their own power. What is happening here is part of that pattern, and every time it goes unchallenged, it becomes easier to justify the next time. The communities most at risk are always the same ones whose political voice was hardest won and remains most vulnerable. The damage to democratic representation does not stay contained to one state or one election cycle. It compounds, and it normalizes, until the exception becomes the rule.
South Carolina has come too far through too much shared struggle and too much hard-won progress to allow itself to become a model for disenfranchisement. The voters of this state, and the voters of this country, deserve leaders who are focused on solving real problems rather than manipulating maps. They deserve a process that protects representation rather than undermining it.
Like most people in South Carolina and America, I am not first a person of a party, but a citizen of my state and country I love dearly. We are children of God who are asked to love neighbors as our equal and this proposed action violates that commandment and divides our state after so much hard-fought progress has been made.
I want to say something to my brothers and sisters in the South Carolina House and Senate. I have so much respect for the difficult tasks that you face from day to day but this is not the fight that advances our state and country. The right path forward is not the easy one. It rarely is. It is time for the leaders of this state to make the right decision in the lasting interest of its citizens.
Leaders do come and go but the electoral process endures. South Carolina, let’s not set bad precedents, that will damage our democracy for decades to come. If we do, we are all losers.
David Beasley of Society Hill is a former governor of South Carolina.
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