♪ > Welcome to This Week in South Carolina, I'm Gavin Jackson.

This week we're looking at the latest findings from a Winthrop poll with Doctor Scott Huffmon.

But first, we have the latest on the 1.8 billion dollar accounting discrepancy on State books and a Senate Finance Subcommittee report led by Berkeley Republican Senator Larry Grooms, who's on set with us.

Senator Grooms, thanks for coming back.

Sen. Grooms> Thank you for having me.

Senator Grooms, earlier in January, we received this forensic audit from AlixPartners, which traced the roots of this 1.8 billion dollar accounting discrepancy, finding that most of that money was not real.

To the extent we were led to believe at one point from the treasurer.

Now your subcommittee has published a report with significant findings and recommendations, including the removal of Treasurer Chris Loftis from office.

So, tell us about these findings in the report.

And that big recommendation, among others.

> We've spent the last 15 months trying to uncover the origins and purpose of a mysterious 1.8 billion dollar fund.

And last year, when I was here with you, there was some question about the 1.8 billion dollars.

Some folks wanted to spend it.

Some wanted to give it back to the taxpayer.

And I was hopeful that a forensic accounting team could at least tell us where the money belonged, if the money existed.

And sure enough, after having some of the, nation's expert forensic auditors come in, take a look at our books, who had the expertise to try to, find out "what is this account all about?"

They came to the conclusion in their published report in January, that the 1.8 billion dollar fund that we had assurances of actually existed, turned out it did not exist.

And in my mind, if the Treasurer doesn't understand whether the 1.8 billion dollars is real or not, perhaps he's not qualified for the job.

But we continued our investigation.

We wanted to find out from the State Auditor, the Comptroller General, we had the forensic auditors to come in and testify.

We wanted to get a better handle of what was going on.

The whole time, we were documenting everything.

And so we released our report, about a 49 page report earlier this week.

And with, close to 605 pages of documentation.

So it's a very well documented, piece of work.

It's, it will withstand any type of scrutiny.

And I attest to its accuracy.

And what we now know was in 2016, at the direction of the State Treasurer Curtis Loftis, employees of the State Treasury began converting accounts from an old accounting system to a new accounting system.

In 2017, they knew there were errors with the conversion process.

They believed that the conversion process would correct itself, but it didn't.

The following year, the sum grew to 1.8 billion dollars.

So instead of trying to find the mistake or correct the mistake, it was covered up.

It was hidden.

It was coded in a way that it, did normally appear on our state's books.

So for the past seven or more years, the books of the State Treasury were not accurate and they were not complete.

To this day, the State Treasury books are not accurate and are not complete.

The State Treasurer has five, has more than five statutory duties.

But there are five statutory duties that he has violated, that he has broken.

And they all relate to having accurate and true books of the Treasury and now we know that they were not accurate, they were not complete.

There are other reporting requirements that the treasurer has a legal obligation to fulfill, and he failed in those duties.

Had he lived up, had he abided by the State Law that, that binds him to his job, that spells out what his duties are, we would not have a 1.8 billion dollar error within our State Treasury.

Hundreds of billions, hundreds of millions of dollars of errors is not acceptable.

And having those errors within our books for at least the past seven years, while he knew about them, failed to disclose them is a breach of duty that deserves action.

It deserves accountability.

The people of the state deserve, deserve to have a Treasurer who can understand what money is real, what money is not.

People of the state deserve to have a Treasurer who can keep accurate books of the State.

He has failed in those duties, and our subcommittee ultimately recommended that we invoke a provision of our Constitution to remove him from office.

Gavin> And we can get into some more details about that.

We do have five minutes left, but the Treasurer did admit to some, some fault, but also shared that blame with the Comptroller General's office and the Auditor's office.

Both of those folks who were in those offices at the time involved in this have resigned.

The Treasurer's not resigned.

He's not heed those calls.

And now, it sounds like he may be impeached.

But with that being said, I want to say what, I want to mention what he said on his Facebook.

And that was Treasurer Loftis saying, quote, "Senator Larry Grooms goes to the well of the Senate and talks about me with utter contempt.

He utilizes his Senatorial immunity because he can't be prosecuted for false statements made about me.

He could have volunteered to take an oath to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

But he did not."

He also opposed it, saying "That the State Senate Finance Committee met today and shocked even me.

Senator Grooms' report was inaccurate, misleading and petty."

Quote.

So, are you not telling the truth?

Are you telling the truth, the whole truth?

Sen. Grooms> I solemnly swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help me God.

Gavin> You've taken enough, an oath of office too.

(laughter) Sen. Grooms> The Treasurer is doing everything he can to misdirect... attention away from the errors and statutory obligations that he has failed at.

He has failed us as a State Treasurer.

The books of the Treasury are not accurate.

They are not correct.

He has violated his oath of office, by not upholding the duties that he has sworn to do.

So if you can't attack the evidence, you attack the messenger, and he can attack me all he wants to.

That's still not going to correct the books of the Treasury until we get a Treasurer who can take responsibility for his mistakes and work on behalf of the people of South Carolina, and faithfully discharge the duties of his office.

Gavin> Yeah, and your whole report, everyone who testified was under oath.

Y'all are under oath as well.

You've sworn an oath to office.

And there's also this whole audit done by an outside independent firm to the tune of 3 million dollars to taxpayer dollars.

But the Governor can remove a Constitutional Officer from office pending a hearing and two-thirds vote in both chambers.

Is this where this is heading?

How does this play out moving forward?

Sen. Grooms> That was our subcommittee's recommendation.

There'll be some discussion, there's been some discussion among Senate members and Senate leadership.

And on Tuesday, we will probably make some announcements as to what action the Senate, as a whole, will be taking.

Gavin> And can we do this?

I mean, is this possible?

It's never happened before.

I mean, what kind of time frame do you need to make something like this happen from, from what you understand?

Sen. Grooms> Well, right now we know that the errors of the Treasurer has cost the taxpayers somewhere about 10 million dollars.

Our state is now embroiled in a Securities and Exchange Commission investigation because of the way our State's books are right now.

The books are inaccurate.

They have not been corrected.

We've had to hire, a forensic auditing team to help us understand the origins.

We're now having to hire, an outside monitor to monitor what occurs within our State Treasury and how the State Treasury books are then recorded by the Comptroller General.

This is all costing taxpayer money.

We now just had a subcommittee hearing, where our Attorney General, at the subcommittee, let us know that the legal fees are now mounting, and next year they're going to be around 15 million dollars.

So, we're up to 25 million dollars in taxpayer money to try to, protect, the taxpayer from what's happening with the, with the corruption that we now see within our state's books, that the State books are corrupted, that rusted.

They can't be trusted.

They have to be fixed.

And I don't know how they can be fixed if the cause of the issue is still there, and that would be our Treasurer.

Gavin> Yes, Senator.

We have less than a minute.

And one of those recommendations was full and complete accounting on those books.

Also dealing with that compliance consultant and also some changes to the Constitution and maybe getting these folks appointed by the Governor instead of elected.

So when it comes down to it, with 30 seconds.

Is this the closest as you're going to get to some oversight of the Treasurer's office, the Treasurer's office, without actually going to an election at this point?

Sen. Grooms> This is what, the Constitution gives the General Assembly as a means of correction.

It's, it's usually correct these things at the ballot box, but the Constitution gives this remedy for, for just this occasion when we have a Constitutional Officer who has violated his oath, his duties, and is now harming the people of our state.

Gavin> And is there support in the Senate to do this?

Sen. Grooms> I believe, I believe there's overwhelming support in the Senate to do this.

Gavin> We'll be watching.

That's Berkeley Senator Larry Grooms, thank you so much.

Sen. Grooms> Thank you.

> Joining me now to discuss the latest findings from the Winthrop poll is its author Scott Huffmon.

He's Winthrop University Political Science Professor, up there at Winthrop.

Scott, thanks for joining us.

Dr. Huffmon> My pleasure.

Glad to be with you.

Gavin> So, Scott, you conducted a general population survey of 1200 South Carolinians between February 21st and March 5th, looking at a variety of topics from Presidential approval ratings and other actions taken by the administration, down to some local issues.

And of course, who's the most popular, statewide elected official in the state as well.

But let's start with the pending 2026 Governor's race.

It's still very early, but we are gearing up for that race, especially that primary, the Republican Primary that will take place next June.

You surveyed a couple of different names floating around that I'm going to read off right now, just to kind of gauge where people were in terms of how they knew these folks.

And so far, you asked about First District Congresswoman Nancy Mace, 2018 Gubernatorial Candidate John Warren, Fifth District Congressman Ralph Norman, Lieutenant Governor Pamela Evette, Spartanburg Senator Josh Kimbrell, and Attorney General Alan Wilson.

What did your, what does your poll find at this point?

And were you surprised by the findings?

> Well, you know, first of all, this election is over a year away.

So, you know, polling likely voters, people who say they're likely to vote in it.

I don't think we would have gotten much.

We generally do general population polls, anyway.

We did break it down though, for the general population and people who said they were Republicans who had voted in the Republican Presidential Primary.

What we found didn't surprise me because we didn't ask who they were going to vote for.

We asked how familiar.

We asked name recognition.

And not surprisingly, Nancy Mace was the most recognizable name.

She is very good at, you know, getting her name out there, appearing on cable news, making sure she is in the news.

Next, of course, was Alan Wilson, who, not surprisingly, because he is a statewide elected official, our Attorney General.

And then the rest were much lower, especially among the general population.

Among Republicans who had voted in the previous presidential primary, they were a little better known.

But again, the best known person was Nancy Mace.

That said, having the highest name recognition doesn't automatically translate into votes, especially this far out.

Gavin> And why is that, Scott?

Is it just because "Hey, I've seen your name that doesn't necessarily mean I like you essentially.

It's just that you've been getting so many headlines."

Especially with Mace she's on social media constantly.

She made a lot of, accusations about sexual misconduct from the House Floor in a very fiery speech.

And then you have people like Lieutenant Governor Pamela Evette, who's maybe not making as much headway, not making as many waves, I should say.

Same with the Attorney General, who's been just kind of doing his, his normal stuff as AG.

Is that going to be something that we're going to start watching change over the coming months, I guess, to see really who is getting that support?

Dr. Huffmon> Yeah, I think it is, again, you know, as you said, just because you know a name doesn't mean that that's who, the horse you're going to back in the race.

What it means is, you're going to have to spend less of your campaign money getting your name well known in the state.

The people who strong Republicans might vote for, and again, it's mainly, overwhelmingly going to be just strong Republicans voting in that primary.

The people who are going to vote in that primary, once they become familiar with all the candidates, it might not be the person whose name they most recognized a year before.

But again, what that means is anybody who's lower on the list for name recognition, will have to spend more of their money early on in the campaign to get their name well known across the state.

Gavin> Yeah.

So when we're talking about trying to break out here, money's going to be key.

We've already seen Lieutenant Governor Pamela Evette get some outside money here from a pro-Trump PAC.

And everyone's gonna be competing for that Trump endorsement as well.

And, of course, no one has formally announced yet, but these are all the names that are floating around.

So but, Scott, just look at the field.

Look at the people that you survey those names.

It seems like there's a lot of familiarity in that field.

I mean, what do you think folks are going to really have to do?

I mean, is it going to be a matter of bomb throwing?

Is it going to be a matter of who gets that Trump endorsement?

Running as right as possible for these primary voters.

Just based on what you've seen in past primaries, what you think these folks are gonna have to do, especially since they all share pretty similar messages?

Dr. Huffmon> Well, you know, of course, in, you know, representative districts that are so gerrymandered, you definitely have to run far to the right or far to the left.

This of course, is a statewide race, but once again, it is the strongest partisans who show up.

So you're not going to win by saying, "Hey, we need to change things nationally and be much more moderate in our conservatism."

That is not how you're going to win over the folks who are going to participate in the Republican Gubernatorial Primary.

You know, endorsements do matter, especially in races like this.

Remember, Nikki Haley was at the bottom of a list of four, I believe, and then Sarah Palin endorsed her and jumped her up, and she, you know, won in a runoff.

So that can really matter as folks vie for those really important endorsements from Trump and of course, from Nikki Haley as well.

But, they are going to have to run further to the right than they would in a general election.

Hit the issues that are important nationally because all politics are national now.

Tip O'Neill's days are over, saying all politics is local.

That is just simply not the case anymore.

Gavin> Interesting point right there for sure.

When we look at one of those candidates, potential candidates, Senator Josh Kimbrell, had some of the lowest name ID and said this week that he's launching an exploratory committee to look into a run, which I'm told is just weeks away at this point.

Is this a move that you kind of have to do at this stage?

Again, more than a year out from that June primary that you have to do in order to get that name ID out there, to start spending money and raising money to get folks to know who you are.

Dr. Huffmon> Absolutely.

You have to begin building the apparatus that will help you raise money first and foremost, because you need money to get your name out there.

You will also be sort of looking around for people who might back you.

You will be testing messages to see what works best.

Do you need to kind of play with different messages in different parts of the state as you travel around?

Where are going to be the most important places to run your ads on TV?

Where do you need to visit more than others?

An exploratory committee kind of touches on all those things, but as you said, the first things that it does is help you find a network to raise money because that's what you need to do all those other things.

Gavin> And I know we're really focused on this Governor's race and this, it's still very early, but when we look at Congresswoman Nancy Mace, Scott, we've seen, her take a lot of different sides take a lot different issues.

She's made a lot of different claims.

She's, again, constantly on social media.

A big issue for her is transgender issues.

Just based on what you've seen so far, again, nothing is official, nothing is formal when it comes to a race, but do you think what you've seen from Congresswoman Mace is going to translate statewide?

Do you think some of her, her situations with her personal life is going to help or hurt her?

How do you, how do you kind of maybe sum up Congresswoman Mace's potential right now at this point?

Dr. Huffmon> I'm not sure how anything involved in her personal life will play out a year from now.

Trans issues are a very symbolic issue.

They, it's really not a relevant issue for the most part.

There are very few trans folks.

There, you know, I think only ten trans athletes in the... in the NCAA.

So this issue is much more symbolic, but it is a symbolic issue that conservatives across the country, strong conservatives care a lot about.

And it's a way to get an earworm in their ear, so that they will listen to other things you say.

So she is really hitting an issue with that, that even though it is primarily symbolic, that is the kind of issue you need to put your name on in order to get people who are further right in the Republican Party, and that's who she needs to win over.

> And of course, this is a statewide race, but when you talk about, you know, gerrymandering and other issues in our state, you recently put out a column in the Post and Courier , titled "Many SC moderates wish our politics will change.

Here's why it probably won't."

It's something we've talked about before, even with an influx of, transplants to the state bringing a variety of political ideologies with them.

What was the gist of your column there?

What were you getting at?

What do you tell folks when they ask you about possibly seeing the state becoming purple, even though we've seen it be largely red and remaining very red?

> Well, the interesting thing about South Carolina is it is one of the growth states in the South.

It used to be rim South, deep South.

Now we break up the South as the growth South and the stagnant South.

In pretty much every other growth South state.

We see that growth pushing it towards more purple as people come into the urban areas, and they're much more blue.

In South Carolina, a lot of the growth are retirees, and they're bringing down their conservative beliefs.

And so we aren't becoming as purple as a lot of other Southern growth states.

So again, the growth here isn't exactly matching growth in other, Southern states where we see that purple hue beginning to take hold.

Gavin> And when we look at some popular statewide elected officials, Governor McMaster continues to enjoy being the most popular statewide elected official.

I'm wondering, do you think folks will look at that popularity and that might translate into maybe some temperament, some messaging, some approaches to governing, governing when we look at his successor?

Or do you think that's just classic Henry McMaster and how he's always approached politics?

Do you think we're going to see any remnants of him and his legacy in his successor?

Dr. Huffmon> Well, I think when folks are running, they will latch on to the things that Henry McMaster has done that have been popular.

You know, obviously his Lieutenant Governor is going to jump on and take credit for a lot of those as well.

But as you mentioned, you know, moderates just don't show up for the primaries.

So all these folks who would like a more moderate version of conservatism, or on the other side, a more moderate version of liberalism.

They're not the ones showing up.

So the part of Henry McMaster's legacy that the candidates are going to latch on to as, "Hey, this is my issue too," are the ones that are most popular with conservatives in the state.

More, much more than ones that are popular with the state in general.

Gavin> And when we look at Senator Lindsey Graham, not the most popular statewide elected official.

In fact, he lags in popularity, always seems to, with an approval rating at 34 percent.

Among Republicans, that support moves up to 55 percent.

Should Graham, who is up for reelection in 2026 and will likely have some challengers.

Do you think he should be worried when he sees numbers like that?

Or do you think, you know, he's maybe not counting... not banking too much, but also not taking anything for granted, but also realizing that he has more than 50 million dollars in the bank, has a strong team, endorsements, and a machine across the state.

How do you see Lindsey Graham looking at those popularity numbers and his operation going into 2026?

Dr. Huffmon> Yeah, I think you've hit the nail on the head.

He knows that he has to watch his back, but also that he's got a huge war chest.

He can tap into some endorsements again.

Whichever way the wind blows with Trump, he has been on the correct side of most of it.

When he was seen as criticizing Trump very soon after that, he was the most vicious defender of Brett Kavanaugh during those, you know, hearings for the Supreme Court.

So Lindsey Graham knows when to, lift his sails and let the, the winds blow him, as they may when it comes to conservative politics.

And again, you're going to see a lot of people who are going to claim that Lindsey Graham is too moderate.

He doesn't support Trump enough, but he's got that war chest that's really going to protect him.

And, you know, we've already seen Fifth District Congressman Ralph Norman say he might primary Lindsey Graham.

So there's already some well-known folks that could be coming after him.

But he does have that statewide national machine.

He's got people nationally and internationally that want him to keep his seat.

So again, his network is even broader than the state of South Carolina.

Gavin> And again, someone with that strong support of President Donald Trump versus the Republican primary for Governor, which, it's, again, a pretty much a big fight to see who's going to get Trump's endorsement there when it comes to the Governor's race.

Dr. Huffmon> Yeah, absolutely.

And as long as Lindsey Graham stays on Trump's good side, which occasionally he dances, you know, close to the edge, especially on issues like Russia.

He should be able to get Trump's endorsement, but nothing is a guarantee with President Trump.

Gavin> Yeah.

And you did see that he has about a 53 percent approval rating, among those who have an opinion on the President, in the state.

That's even higher with Republicans, at 81 percent.

Scott, do you think that there's any potential for that to change, even in ruby red South Carolina?

I mean, we had, an alarming report come out from the Atlantic this week, talking about, you know, war plans being shared with a journalist.

We're talking about high level folks sharing intelligence, in a way that we've never really seen before on a commercial messaging app instead of a secure communication.

That's drawing the ire of some in Congress.

But I'm wondering, how you see things like that playing out, potential recession worries when it comes to these tariffs, which you also polled on.

Could we see some sort of, effect of this actually trickling down to folks in South Carolina?

Where even if they're affected by these things, still say they support the President and like his other folks like Lindsey Graham, too.

Dr. Huffmon> Yeah, you know, a lot of people are going to continue to support, you have to remember, most people in South Carolina, are not as informed on politics as the folks watching this show right now.

They, you know, do, other things in their lives when it comes to the media, rather than digging deeply into politics.

So they're actually not aware of a lot of the things that are happening.

They're unfamiliar with a lot of the cuts that DOGE is doing.

They are not really paying attention to how the tariffs might affect their day to day life, because they haven't yet.

Many of them will not hear about you know, these issues with war plans being sent out on unsecure, resources such as Signal.

But there may be a buildup of it chipping away and chipping away, at Trump's popularity among moderate Republicans, that even those who are further away from the middle but not super Trump Republicans.

When people start feeling things, you know, feeling a potential recession, when they start feeling those prices go higher, when they see they have a problem with Social Security, and it might not get fixed.

When all those things come into play, then you're going to see Trump's endorsement might not mean as much in the Congressional elections of 2026.

On the other hand, as long as people are behind Trump and think that these issues are being driven by something other than his specific actions, they will stay behind Trump, at least in, as you said, ruby red South Carolina.

Gavin> And of course, we're more than a year away from those June primaries.

And a lot will happen before then.

And that's why we talk with Scott Huffmon, Political Science Professor at Winthrop University.

Scott, thanks so much for joining us.

Dr. Huffmon> It's always my pleasure.

Gavin> And that's it for us this week, for South Carolina ETV, I'm Gavin Jackson.

Be well South Carolina.

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