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by WILL FOLKS
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Last spring, this media outlet blew the whistle on a flagrantly unconstitutional pay raise advanced by the chronically results-challenged South Carolina General Assembly.
Apparently these fools felt they deserved to be rewarded for the massive spending increases, minuscule tax relief, unaccountable crony capitalism and demonstrably failed outcomes they continue to foist on citizens and taxpayers.
As we first reported last spring, the overwhelming majority of South Carolina’s so-called “Republican” supermajority voted to give themselves an additional $25,500 apiece in taxpayer-funded compensation between May 2025 and November 2026. They did this despite the clear language of the S.C. Constitution (Article III, Section 19), which holds that “no General Assembly shall have the power to increase the per diem of its own members.”
In other words, lawmakers are only allowed to award pay raises to future legislatures – i.e. those General Assemblies chosen in subsequent election cycles. They are not allowed to appropriate additional funds to themselves.
Thankfully, this boondoggle – which would have totaled $4.3 million – was challenged in court by state senator Wes Climer. And last fall, Climer won. The five justices of the S.C. supreme court unanimously struck down the pay raise, noting it “clearly contravenes our constitution.”
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This year, lawmakers are back for another bite at the apple. A bill introduced by senator Shane Martin, S. 933, would double lawmakers base compensation from $22,400 to $47,500 annually – and include automatic pay hikes of up to 5% every other year.
Keep in mind, lawmakers are only in session from mid-January to early May – roughly three-and-a-half months of the year. They also only work Tuesdays through Thursdays during that time period.
On the flip side, they haven’t seen a pay increase since the 1990s for this part-time position.
News of the pay raise proposal – which is currently sitting in the S.C. Senate finance committee – enraged former state lawmaker Ralph Norman, who is campaigning for the GOP gubernatorial nomination. Norman, who represents the Palmetto State’s fifth district in the U.S. congress, has made opposing pay raises for politicians a centerpiece of his service in Washington, D.C. as well as his campaign for governor.
“No legislator in Columbia deserves a pay raise!” Norman said in a statement. “This is irresponsible and a waste of taxpayer dollars! I am running for governor to Clean Up Columbia and get rid of the waste, fraud, and abuse, and we must begin by stopping these reckless pay raise schemes that are getting little to no attention! Taxpayers deserve transparency and accountability!!”
Reached for comment, Martin told us he was simply trying to keep legislative pay in line with decades of inflation – part of his goal to make serving in the legislature more feasible for a greater number of citizens.
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“We almost are at the point where you’ve got to be rich, retired or retained to be down here,” Martin told us. “I am simply trying to adjust legislative compensation to keep up with inflation after thirty years of no changes. Everything has been fully transparent, and I hope that we arrive at a solution that allows the average South Carolinian to keep serving, because government by the rich won’t end well for the taxpayers.”
FITSNews has previously stated we have no objection to lawmakers being paid more money – so long as any funding increases are accompanied by stringent anti-corruption legislation. In fact, nearly nine years ago we proposed an inflation-adjusted $80,000 annual salary for lawmakers – although this pay hike would have been accompanied by “the most draconian anti-corruption measures South Carolina state government has ever seen.”
Under our proposal, lawmakers would have received a larger base salary – enabling more non-attorneys to serve – but their ability to profit from elected office would have been completely eliminated. Included within this draconian ban would have been constitutional restrictions on legislative meddling in other branches of government – including the elimination of the current legislatively controlled judicial selection racket.
“Until those reforms are enacted, lawmakers should not receive any additional taxpayer-funded compensation,” we editorialized at the time.
Indeed, recent events in the S.C. Senate have capably demonstrated the need for such draconian anti-corruption legislation.
Keep it tuned to FITSNews as we track the progress of this bill…
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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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3 comments
Ralph is obsessed with salaries. He opposes this raise and the raise for federal Congresspeople as well. While I don’t know if pay raises are fair or necessary for ordinary people to afford to run for office, I do know this is a drop in the ocean, and certainly not near the top of the most corrupt things to fight.
Ralph is a US Congressman who seems to have checked out of his federal duties to go after local people. For example, the US Government is spending one billion dollars to refurbish an airplane for Donald Trump to use when he is no longer President. Further, since we are borrowing that money to pay for that refurbishment, at today’s interest rate that is going to cost us one billion dollars, plus 30 million dollars a year in interest. We will get absolutely nothing in return for that money. We are paying 3 million a month for Trump to play golf. We will get nothing in return for that. We are paying a billion dollars a day to bomb Iran. A war that Saudi Arabia and Israel wanted, and they are paying money to Trump’s family. Ralph has not raised one objection to any of that spending.
We live in sad times. Corruption is rampant and open, but amazingly, Ralph seems to be going after the least corrupt thing Republicans are doing, and saving us little in the process.
The unspoken part is that few average citizens can afford to run for office in the first place. Gone are the days where the people could hear their politicians speak in an uncontrolled setting about what they really stood for and would do in Columbia. MONEY, whether out of one’s own pocket or supporters’, too often dictates who is elected. If the lobbyists can elect a person to the Legislature to do their bidding, they will pull out all stops to keep them in place. Outsiders, normal people, too often do not have the monetary means to effectively challenge an entrenched incumbent. Often the Incumbent will dodge any debate by using the excuse they will not give their opponent a platform. The system is rigged against a grassroots candidate, regardless of party, without the ability to raise money, money, and more money. The Republicans and Democrats in the State House get elected on one platform and then eagerly look to ingratiate themselves with their monied supporters and party leaders.
They know the pay when they run and continue to run. They spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to get the job. It’s about power. Corruption in Columbia is rampant