Republican Sen. Darline Graham of South Carolina and Democratic challenger Annie Andrews clashed Sunday night in their first and perhaps only debate of the general election, tangling over President Donald Trump’s “one big, beautiful bill,” the high costs of gas and goods, the Iran war and AI data centers.
South Carolina is a ruby-red state where Trump remains popular among Republican voters. But the race has tightened in the closing stretch of the campaign, and Democrats believe they have a shot at knocking off Graham, who was appointed to fill her brother Lindsey Graham’s Senate seat after his sudden death in July. The top Senate Republican super PAC has pledged to spend $5 million to shore up Graham’s campaign.
At the start of the debate, hosted in Columbia by South Carolina ETV, Darline Graham noted that Sunday night marked exactly three months since her brother unexpectedly died at age 71.
Andrews, a pediatrician, sought to portray Graham, who previously led a state agency, as an inexperienced empty suit who refuses to stand up to Trump or his unpopular policies. She mocked Graham as “the White House’s ambassador to South Carolina.”
Graham attacked Andrews as the “most radical liberal” to run in South Carolina and as sympathetic to the Democratic Socialist Party. “Annie Andrews will not stand up to the Socialist Democratic Party; she’s only going to join them,” Graham said — a characterization Andrews rejected.
Graham has “been told to come out here and call me Bernie, Ocasio, Mamdani — that’s what’s in her script. But the truth is my name is Annie Andrews, and there shouldn’t be any confusion about that,” Andrews said. “The truth is I support the Second Amendment, I believe we need a secure border, and we need to deport illegal immigrants who break the law. ... The real difference between me and Sen. Graham is that I will stand up to my own party, and I will always put South Carolina first.”
Graham and Andrews are running for a full six-year Senate term; the winner will make history as the first female senator elected from South Carolina. The debate also featured Libertarian Kasie Whitener.
Graham and Andrews tussled over issue after issue. As the country faces Social Security insolvency, Andrews said she would raise caps to make wealthier people pay more but would not hike the retirement age. She added that Republicans like Graham want to privatize Social Security so “Washington insiders” can profit. “Unfortunately, my opponent is in the race to do what Washington insiders tell her,” she said.
Graham shot back that she understands what people in her state are facing. When her parents died at a young age, Social Security benefits helped her and her brother survive. Graham said Andrews’ criticism of Trump’s “one big, beautiful bill” is misplaced because it lowered taxes on tips and Social Security. “You called it the one big, ugly bill, so here you are deceiving the people of South Carolina,” Graham said.
On affordability, Graham said she has “lived paycheck to paycheck” before and acknowledged that “gas prices are high right now. ... I feel the pain, too.” She said that she supports suspending the gas tax and that easing regulations on drilling would permanently bring prices down.
Andrews pinned blame for high gas prices on Graham, who she said voted several times against a war powers resolution to restrict Trump’s war with Iran.
“The war is the exact reason we now have record-high gas and diesel prices. Farmers are getting crushed, and everything costs more,” Andrews said. “My opponent is the only one who had the opportunity to vote to end the war, but three times in a row she voted to continue it.”
Andrews also dinged Graham for admitting during a previous debate that “national security is not my thing.” “South Carolina, if your surgeon said that appendectomies aren’t really his thing, would you still hand him a scalpel? No,” Andrews said. “So why would we hand Darline Graham a full term in the U.S. Senate? She is unserious and unqualified.”
Graham retorted that she wants the war to end, like everyone does, but said she believes in “peace through strength.” Then, she went after Andrews over the national security quip.
“But talking about not my thing, let’s talk about what’s not your thing. Your thing apparently is not being honest with the people of South Carolina. At least I’m honest. If I don’t know something, I am glad to say it, and I’ll say it again tonight,” Graham said without getting specific. “But you have, you are deceiving the people of South Carolina. You have flip-flopped on everything. There’s so many social media posts out there to prove it. Shame on you!”
The proliferation of data centers, which power artificial intelligence companies, has become a major flash point in the midterm elections.
Andrews went right after Graham on the issue, nicknaming her “Data Center Darline.” Andrews said her data-center plan calls for a “two-year moratorium, protections to ensure your rates don’t go up and a return to real local control.”
Graham fired back that stopping construction of all data centers would allow China to win the race for AI dominance. She said she voted for the Ratepayer Protection Act, which aims to shift higher energy costs from building data centers from consumers onto AI companies.
“Under her Bernie Sanders plan, a two-year moratorium, that is dangerous to the national security of our country, because in two years China is going to be so far ahead [that] we are going to be in so much trouble,” Graham said, adding that local communities should decide whether data centers get built in their backyards.
“I want communities to decide. She wants the federal government to decide.”