Shealy ousts incumbent Rankin for Dist. 14 seat
Rick Shealy
Cross Hill businessman Rick Shealy unseated incumbent Luke Rankin with a landslide victory in Tuesday’s South Carolina House of Representatives District 14 Republican primary election.
Rankin was elected in 2024 and served one term in the statehouse after serving one four-year term on Laurens County Council.
Shealy and Democrat Michanna Tate will face off in the Nov. 3 General Election. Tate, a local attorney and business owner, was unchallenged for the Democratic nomination.
Laurens County Council District 4 is headed to a run-off between Jimmy Poole and Lonnie Wilson. Poole was the top vote-getter Tuesday with 879 votes (48%), and Wilson finished with 752 votes (41%). Libby Pinson was last in the three-way race with 197 votes (11%). The winner will fill the seat currently occupied by Councilman Brown Patterson.
With no candidate reaching the 50% plus one threshold to win the primary outright, a run-off election be scheduled for June 23 along with statewide runoffs that will decide nominations for governor and attorney general, among others.
David Stumbo
Eighth Circuit Solicitor David Stumbo is in a run-off for the GOP nomination for attorney general with Stephen Goldfinch, who led the three-candidate field with 41% of the vote. Stumbo garnered 35% of the vote.
Lt. Gov. Pamela Evette and Attorney General Alan Wilson emerged from a five-candidate field and will be in a run-off for the GOP gubernatorial nomination. State Rep. Jermaine Johnson was well on his way to avoiding a run-off for the Democratic nomination with 58% of the vote late Tuesday night.
Early voting for the run-off will be shortened in Laurens County due to the Juneteenth holiday. Early voting is set for June 17-18 at the Office of Voter Registration and elections on Bolt Drive in Laurens.
Shealy earned a 20-point victory in the Republican primary, a large number for a challenger against an incumbent. He finished with 3,089 votes to Rankins 2,050 with all 25 precincts reporting and carried 20 of the precincts.
“I thought it was going to be a little closer because my opponent was an incumbent, but I had a really good team,” Shealy said. “We worked really hard and knocked on a lot of doors.”
He also said he thought his experience as a business owner and agriculture appealed to a large swath of Laurens County voters.
Rep. Luke Rankin (R-Laurens)
“I think experience was a big thing,” said Shealy, who said he expects to align himself with fiscal hawks in Columbia if he defeats Tate in the General Election. “Our team was very effective in getting our message out.”
Rankin said he was proud of the campaign he ran in social media posts following the election.
We fell short tonight, and that’s politics. Sometimes you win, and sometimes you lose,” Rankin wrote. “But one thing I know for sure: God is in control. This result doesn’t change that. I believe He has something bigger and better for me ahead.”
Thank you to everyone who supported, prayed for, volunteered, and believed in this campaign. We gave it everything we had.
Voter turnout in Laurens County for the primary was 26.3%, or 10,794 ballots cast out of 41,054 registered voters.
