Free Republic

GREENVILLE — State Sen. William Timmons stopped Lee Bright’s improbable comeback bid in its tracks Tuesday night, winning the GOP primary runoff in the race to replace U.S. Rep. Trey Gowdy. Just two years after Bright was ousted from his state Senate seat in his own GOP primary, the brash Spartanburg insurance agent won the first round in the 12-candidate Republican 4th Congressional District race, with Timmons narrowly securing the second runoff spot. But Timmons, a first-term lawmaker from Greenville, overcame Bright in the one-on-one runoff, coalescing support behind his argument that Republicans in Greenville and Spartanburg need a polished...

Republican voters in South Carolina’s fourth congressional district will go to the polls in mere hours to pick between two conservative stalwarts in the GOP primary, but only one choice will effectively go on to represent South Carolina conservatives in Washington. Both former state Sen. Lee Bright and current state Sen. William Timmons are sound defenders of liberty. Without question, either leader would be better than ninety percent of the sitting Members of Congress. Each candidate supports President Trump, champions lower taxes and reduced federal spending, and publicly defends the Second Amendment. However, in terms of style, the candidates are...

South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley said a bill that's winding through the legislature to limit transgenders to public restrooms that correspond to their birth genders is not needed – that she hasn't fielded any complaints that would require such legislative steps. "I don't believe it's necessary," she said, during a press conference reported on by the State. "There's not one instance that I'm aware of." Haley went on, the State reported: "When we look at our situation, we're not hearing of anybody's religious liberties that are being violated, and we're again not hearing any citizens that are being violated in...

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — A South Carolina senator wants to bar local governments from requiring businesses to let transgender people use the bathroom of their choice, saying he's taking a "stand for decency and common sense." The bill introduced Wednesday by Sen. Lee Bright would also require multistall bathrooms on public property to be designated and used "based on biological sex." It specifically includes student bathrooms, locker rooms and shower rooms in public schools. How private businesses handle their bathrooms should be up to the owners, not government, he said. He knows of no city in South Carolina where that's...

Lee Bright, a local lawmaker who is serving as the South Carolina co-chair for the presidential campaign of Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), compared the calls to remove the Confederate flag from the capitol building in his home state to a "Stalinist purge." According to a spokesperson for Cruz, those comments don't conflict with the candidate's position on the issue. "What Senator Cruz has said is that this is an issue for the state of South Carolina and South Carolinians to sort out and I think that's what you're watching happen," Cruz campaign spokesman Rick Tyler said in a conversation with...

Challengers see themselves in the Texas senator, even in races where their odds of an upset are considered steeper than Cruz’s surprise victory over a GOP establishment figure two years ago. He’s made endorsements in the Oklahoma and Nebraska Senate races, plus the Nebraska gubernatorial race, and sent almost $26,000 to federal candidates through his leadership PAC. “Ted Cruz would be extremely helpful as an endorser and a fundraiser,” said C. Edmund Wright, a consultant to longshot South Carolina Senate hopeful Lee Bright, in an email. “Rand Paul and Mike Lee would be great also.” But, he said, “the reason...

New grassroots ad. Lee Bright calling out Lindsey Graham.

“Wise Latina” Support and Graham’s Sub 40 Poll Numbers Justice Sonia Sotomayor slipped up this week and exposed herself as a race baiter in her official dissenting opinion in the Michigan case. Meanwhile, Lindsey Graham’s approval numbers continued to slip-slide in the Winthrop poll, diving below 40 per cent. Are the two stories related? “Certainly the Michigan ruling had nothing to do with Graham’s approval problems in this particular poll,” said Lee Bright, the top challenger to Graham in the upcoming Senatorial Primary. “But his many foolish decisions, like supporting Sotomayor for the Court, are coming back to haunt Lindsey...

The Lindsey Graham campaign is still trying to defend the establishment incumbent’s “yes” vote on a key ObamaCare measure – not to mention their highly deceptive TV ad that is now running. “Lindsey Graham still doesn’t get it,” said Lee Bright, the upstate Senator who is the leading challenger to Graham for the Republican nomination. “Leadership takes vision and an understanding of the times. Ted Cruz understands, Graham does not, and that’s why he was joining Team Obama and the Washington establishment in criticizing Cruz at the very moment Cruz was taking the hard stand.” Bright went on to say,...

In what could be a major turning point in the race to oust Lindsey Graham from the U.S. Senate, most of South Carolina’s grassroots and Tea Party leaders are officially lining up to endorse Lee Bright Thursday morning on the front steps of the State House in Columbia. The announcement is set for 10 a.m. The boost for the upstate Senator comes a little over a month after the Tea Party Convention in Myrtle Beach, where the consensus was that Bright carried the candidates’ debate – and had a clear plurality of support – dynamics that have been supported by...

Upstate Senator Lee Bright’s campaign appears to be gaining steam while incumbent Lindsey Graham looks to be in deep trouble according to a recent poll of likely Republican Primary voters in South Carolina. The big picture results of the survey show that South Carolinians are deeply dissatisfied with Graham, Bright is dominating the crowded field of challengers, and both trends seem to be building. Only 38% of voters said that Graham deserves to be re-elected, while 49% said it’s time for someone new. That someone would appear to be Bright, who polled more than Nancy Mace, Bill Connor and Richard...

Not all that long ago, the establishment wing of the Republican Party had the power to demand obedience from its Christian Right flank, but thanks to Internet fundraising and changes to campaign finance laws, the 2014 elections could be a case of the tail wagging the dog. The GOP establishment has always had a monopoly on money, thanks to its unfettered access to the Wall Street donor class. As a result of this power differential, the Christian Right, while energized and mobilized, would be forced to sit when told to sit by the party’s big wigs. But those days are...

Between 2007 and 2011, there were over 43,000 bankruptcies just in South Carolina. That number grows substantially when you include businesses that failed or closed-up even if they did not end in a technical bankruptcy. Unfortunately, my own business was one of them.

LINDSEY GRAHAMS APPEASEMENT APPROACH PROVEN FAILURE The naïve bipartisan strategy preferred by Republican moderates like Lindsey Graham, John McCain and Mitch McConnell was further embarrassed on Thursday, as Harry Reid and the Democrats rammed through a measure limiting the rights of the Senate minority on a party line vote. “I wonder if Lindsey Graham and John McCain have learned their lesson yet” said Lee Bright following the 52-48 vote engineered by Reid that takes away the 60 vote cloture rules on certain Senate votes. The conservative challenger to Graham who has been picking up major endorsements and straw poll victories...

Laurens County GOP Chairman Says Graham becoming more and more of a Democrat: Under normal circumstances, party officials tend to back incumbents. Laurens County GOP Chairman Travis Cash knows that 2014 is not a normal circumstance, and is enthusiastically endorsing Lee Bright for the U.S. Senate. “This is a man who has consistently voted for constitutional law, and when he says he’ll do something, he does it,” says Cash of Bright. “He’ll continue that going into the US Senate. When you hear (the party establishment) attacking Lee Bright, you know he’s doing the job right.” This assessment of Bright stands...

ALSO REJECT COMMON CORE: A NEW CONCEPT FOR LINDSEY The York County GOP gave Lee Bright’s surging campaign a pair of convincing straw poll victories last week, as the upstate Senator from Spartanburg picked up a large plurality of the executive committee vote as well as the general membership vote. Bright defeated Lindsey Graham 42-21% among the Executive Committee members, with 27% undecided and no one else above 6% – and 42-16% among all members present. In addition, the membership voted unanimously to adopt the RNC’s resolution to flatly reject Common Core. “This is another great result for our campaign,”...

A poll conducted by Harper Polling released today shows US Senator Lindsey Graham remains vulnerable and within the margin of error of being forced into a head-to-head runoff against a conservative challenger in the 2014 South Carolina Republican primary for re-election. Meanwhile, among those vying to replace Graham, South Carolina State Senator Lee Bright has broken away as the main challenger with more support than all others taking on Graham combined.

GUN RIGHTS ACROSS AMERICA NOT IMPRESSED BY GRAHAMS AR 15 PHOTO OP Upstate Senator Lee Bright picked up the second significant national endorsement in less than a week Wednesday – this one from Gun Rights Across America. “Gun Rights Across America stands for no compromise concerning our Second Amendment rights,” said the group in their endorsement statement. “We are proud to endorse state Senator Lee Bright, due to his unwavering and constitutional stance on Second Amendment liberties. Senator Bright would be a valuable asset in the US Senate and we fully support his candidacy.” Lee Bright enthusiastically embraced the announcement,...

In the Republican Liberty Caucus’ endorsement of state Sen. Lee Bright for the U.S. Senate Wednesday, the group’s seemingly mild-mannered, genial state chairman stepped up to a podium here to offer particular praise not usually associated with the pugnacious politician he was feting. “The thing that really stands out for me is that he is a unifier. He can bring together the various aspects, the various segments of the Republican Party of South Carolina,” said RLC South Carolina chairman Scott Pearson. “And he can do that in a way that our incumbent is not able to do.” In just a...

The Republican Liberty Caucus (RLC), a group with ties to Ted Cruz, Mike Lee, Jim DeMint and other prominent liberty minded and Tea Party conservatives, is officially endorsing upstate Senator Lee Bright over Lindsey Graham and others in the 2014 South Carolina Senate race. This endorsement is a startling development in the race considering national RLC’s stature, the timing of the support and the zeal with which they endorse Senator Bright. Matt Nye, Chairman of the National RLC said in a statement that “the outcome of the South Carolina Senate race will be a major factor in determining the future...