Columbia, SC - Democratic Leaders and Party chairs from across the Deep South are delivering forceful, unified calls to the Democratic National Committee’s Rules and Bylaws Committee, urging the preservation of South Carolina’s first-in-the-nation and first-in-the-south presidential primary status. The coordinated advocacy comes as the DNC prepares to revisit its nominating calendar and amid a landmark moment for voting rights across the country.
In a formal letter to Democratic National Committee Chair Ken Martin and members of the Rules and Bylaws Committee, Congressional Black Caucus Institute Chair and Mississippi Congressman Bennie G. Thompson argues that South Carolina’s elevated place in the primary calendar represents far more than procedural scheduling.
“South Carolina’s first-in-the-nation status is not a procedural privilege; it is a hard-won recognition that the Democratic Party’s coalition must be centered, not assumed,” Thompson wrote. “To remove or diminish South Carolina’s standing in the primary calendar would send precisely the wrong message to Black voters and to every voter who has been told their voice does not matter until after the outcome is already decided.”
The CBCI letter highlights the organization’s decades-long partnership with the South Carolina Democratic Party, including co-hosting three pivotal presidential primary debates: the 2008 Myrtle Beach debate that became a defining clash between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton; the 2016 Charleston debate that opened the campaign year; and the 2020 Charleston debate.
The call for South Carolina’s continued primacy takes on added urgency in the wake of the Supreme Court’s April 29, 2026, ruling in Louisiana v. Callais, a 6-3 decision that significantly curtailed Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act. In a joint statement, Democratic Party chairs from Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Arkansas, and West Virginia condemned the ruling as “the most consequential rollback of voting rights protections in a generation,” and agreed it makes South Carolina’s first-in-the-nation status more essential than ever.
“When South Carolina goes first, presidential candidates are forced to engage with communities that the Callais decision has now attempted to silence,” the Southern chairs wrote. “When South Carolina goes first, we send a message to the nation that the Democratic Party will not retreat from its commitment to multiracial democracy, even as the courts and the Republican Party work in concert to undermine it.”
Both letters underscore the demographic significance of South Carolina’s electorate. A majority-minority Democratic primary voting base that includes Black voters, rural communities, working families, veterans, labor unions, and faith communities. The Southern chairs were direct in warning the DNC that any diminishment of South Carolina’s role “would signal to Southern Democrats and to Black voters in particular that their loyalty to this party is taken for granted.”
About the Congressional Black Caucus Institute
The Congressional Black Caucus Institute (CBCI) is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization with more than four decades of work in voter registration, civic leadership training, and democratic participation. The Institute has partnered with the South Carolina Democratic Party since 2008 to host presidential primary debates and advance the political empowerment of Black Americans throughout the Deep South.