South Carolina has made significant progress concerning election reform. The latest Election Integrity Scorecard from The Heritage Foundation which was updated in November of 2025, ranks South Carolina pegged at 9th best in the country with a score of 81 out of 100. North Carolina scored 70 and Georgia 83. The highest scores in the
South Carolina lawmakers took a real step toward judicial reform in 2024. Governor McMaster signed S.1046 into law that July, changing how the state screens and selects most judges. It was a genuine win, years in the making. But one corner of the courthouse was left untouched: magistrate court. That was a problem, because magistrate
The State of South Carolina just made a strong statement in favor of American manufacturing. H.4709, the Buy American Iron and Steel Act, passed both chambers of the South Carolina General Assembly and has been signed by the Governor. This legislation mandates the use of iron and steel manufactured in America for public work projects funded by the state treasury. The notion behind the legislation is rather simple, but it has the
On July 31, 2017, construction was halted on the V.C. Summer Units II and III nuclear expansion project in Fairfield County. One of the entities responsible for the project’s failure was South Carolina’s state-owned utility, Santee Cooper. After the debacle, Santee Cooper and its V.C. Summer co-owner, SCE&G (now subsumed by Dominion Energy) assumed billions in debt from the failure of the project. SCE&G turned to ratepayers and to Investor-Owned Utility (IOU) Dominion to
Impaired driving is a serious issue in South Carolina. South Carolina leads the nation in the number of fatalities resulting from drunk driving, with 6.92 deaths per 100,000 citizens, according to federal highway data. This tragic statistic should not be taken lightly. A viable solution may lie in bills like H.3857, S.849, and S.52, which
As Palmetto Promise has discussed regularly on this blog, there is a glaring problem with the South Carolina civil justice system that allows what we have termed “billboard lawyers” to target legitimate businesses for “nuclear” verdicts just because those businesses are successful, not necessarily because they are at fault. The most targeted businesses in the
H.3408, introduced in the 2025-26 General Assembly by Rep. Patrick Haddon (R-Greenville), is designed to prevent the ownership of South Carolina land by foreign adversaries of the United States, such as Iran, North Korea, the People’s Republic of China, and the Russian Federation. The threat of hostile countries purchasing American land to gain a strategic
Pharmacy Benefit Managers (PBMs) are companies that act as intermediaries between drug manufacturers, health insurers, and pharmacies. PBMs do not directly distribute medications, but they play a pivotal role in attempting to control costs, determining quantities of medication available, and altering the overall consumer experience. Most Americans have at some point in their lives been
New data indicate that telemedicine has the potential to be a “great equalizer” for maternal health. As we have written previously, the 2024 Telehealth and Telemedicine Modernization Act made strides in making telemedicine accessible to more South Carolinians. But while this legislation made progress, it did not go far enough to decrease the barriers we
According to the Brookings Institution and the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), three simple steps, obtaining at least a high school diploma, securing full-time employment, and waiting until marriage to begin having children, can drastically lower your chances of experiencing poverty. Known as “The Success Sequence,” this proven formula was first identified by social historian Barbara
