Seven Days: How to Tell if South Carolina Lawmakers Mean Business… or Not

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by WILL FOLKS

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With South Carolina state lawmakers set to return to the capital city of Columbia next Tuesday (January 13, 2026) for yet another legislative session, our media outlet has been keeping its audience apprised of the big issues facing them upon their arrival.

The 2026 session of the S.C. General Assembly could prove paradigm-altering seeing as it occurs not only in an election year – but, more importantly, amidst a surge in support for the forces of reform. There is a window of accountability opening… and a frustrated GOP electorate seems plenty eager to throw certain establishment “Republicans” out of it if they fail to adopt meaningful change.

But in addition to knowing the key reforms – and the two-faced politicians who are constantly blocking their implementation – it’s also important to understand how the legislative process works. Specifically, it’s important to recognize the games lawmakers routinely play in an effort to fool primary voters into thinking they are taking action when all they are really doing is preserving the status quo.

As an astute observer noted on our site just this week, South Carolina lawmakers love to misdirect and obfuscate – engaging in confusion “by design.” By playing procedural games – and playing one chamber of the General Assembly against the other – legislative leaders can manipulate the process to ensure real reforms die on the vine (even as they pay lip service to them in the press and on the campaign trail).

It is a classic shell game… facilitated by a steady flow of special interest money from the very forces aligned against reform.

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RELATED | THE WAR FOR JUSTICE IN SOUTH CAROLINA

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Basically, the people profiting from South Carolina’s corrupt system are paying our politicians to lie to us about how “conservative” they are – and how hard they are trying to “fix” Columbia. Even if they make belated acknowledgments that changes are necessary to move our state forward, these blowhards will run out the clock for as long as they possibly can – ensuring a steady stream of ongoing revenue for lobbyists, consultants and “influencers” in the process.

Why fix something if so many insiders can profit from it staying broken, right?

Look no further than the issue of legislative term limits, which is ostensibly supported by overwhelming majorities of both chambers – yet never gets close to passing out of either one of them.

Funny how that works, right?

Every year, though, a new term limits bill is rolled out with eleventy kajillion sponsors… and every year the pro-term limits movement rakes in tons of money from gullible voters convinced this year is the year it’s finally going to happen for them.

Whatever issue you care about, chances are your representatives and senators in Columbia aren’t just lying to you about their true position – they’re actively sabotaging their stated position. Chance are, they’re either conspiring to kill the very bills they profess to support – or dragging them out interminably to profit from their ongoing obstructionism.

So, what does it look like when lawmakers actually want to accomplish something? How long does it take for a bill to get passed in that case?

Glad you asked…

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It turns out the standard for action isn’t passing a bill by the end of the legislative session in early May, or by the so-called “crossover deadline” (an arbitrary procedural impediment) in early April, or by the commencement of the partisan primary election season in mid-March.

No, the standard for legislative action is actually much faster than that…

Our audience will recall that three years ago, lawmakers approved a massive $1.3 billion incentive package for crony capitalist carmaker Scout Motors – a subsidiary of über-woke Volkswagen. This investment – which came at a terrible time in the evolution of the electric vehicle market – has been an unmitigated disaster.

In fact, the Scout deal is resembling previous failed boondoggles more and more with each passing day.

But as it relates to our current object lesson, this crony capitalist debacle is instructive. Scout’s $1.3 billion handout – which continues to grow, incidentally – was attached as an amendment to an existing piece of legislation on March 8, 2023. Within that same week, both chambers of the legislature – by super-majority margins – had approved it. On March 15, 2023, seven days after the language was introduced, a ratified version of the bill was on the governor’s desk.

That’s right… seven days. Or as Barenaked Ladies like to say, “One Week.”

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Scout’s $1.3 billion handout went from nonexistent to a done deal in seven days.

The moral of this story? If a crony capitalist, über woke corporation demanding an unprecedented sum of taxpayer money for a speculative command economic development scheme (one flying in the face of not just the free market, but prevailing market conditions) can get the S.C. General Assembly to move in seven days… so should you.

As a citizen and taxpayer of South Carolina, so should you. That’s especially true if you are advocating on behalf of a critical tax, education, infrastructure or justice reform bill that is years – perhaps decades – overdue.

Don’t accept excuses. Don’t permit them to play games. Don’t let them say they ran out of time – or lacked the “political will” to implement necessary change. Because with the Scout boondoggle, they’ve shown exactly what their “political will” can accomplish when they set their minds to it – and they’ve shown us how fast they can accomplish it.

Talk is cheap… this is the year South Carolina lawmakers must take action. And that right quickly…

If they fail to do so, every single lawmaker standing in the way of change should be challenged and voted out of office.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR…

Will Folks is the founding editor of the news outlet you are currently reading. Prior to founding FITSNews, he served as press secretary to the governor of South Carolina. He lives in the Midlands region of the state with his wife and eight children.

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