by WILL FOLKS
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Decades ago, a report on alleged irregularities in the administration of South Carolina’s bar exam helped put FITSNews on the map. According to our sources at the time – and subsequently confirmed by mainstream media – the supreme court tossed the results of an entire section of the test in order to help the daughter of a powerful lawmaker and the daughter of a veteran circuit court judge score a passing grade.
Vintage South Carolina, right?
While the scandals associated with this test have subsided, we’ve continued to follow this biannual rite as a means of holding the state’s law schools accountable.
This week, though, the Palmetto State appears to be dealing with yet another bar exam scandal.
Results from the July 2026 uniform bar exam were set to be released by the S.C. supreme court’s bar admissions office this Friday (October 16, 2026) at 4:00 p.m. EDT. In fact, the court sent out a notification on Monday (October 12, 2026) attesting to the appointed hour.
Across the state, aspiring attorneys – and the firms set to employ them – set their alarms.
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On Wednesday (October 14, 2026), however, the court announced it was releasing the results two days early after an apparent unauthorized leak of the information.
“It has come to the Supreme Court’s attention that certain individuals gained access to the examination results before their scheduled release,” read a statement posted to the admissions page.
What happened?
The court isn’t saying… although the statement insisted “this premature access was not attributable to a technical malfunction or security breach.”
“In the interest of fairness and transparency, the Court has elected to publish the examination results earlier than originally scheduled,” the statement added.
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While we believe the circumstances surrounding this premature release warrant further scrutiny, the published results were positive for both the University of South Carolina law school and the much-maligned Charleston School of Law (CSOL). According to the court’s earlier-than-expected tally, 154 of 167 South Carolina law school graduates (or 92.22% of test takers) passed the exam. Meanwhile, 98 of 144 CSOL graduates (or 68.06%) passed the exam.
A decade ago, South Carolina’s passage rate on the exam was just 76.2% while CSOL’s was an embarrassingly low 43.5%.
FITSNews has reached out to the high court in an effort to ascertain more information about the circumstances surrounding the leaking of the bar exam results. Specifically, we’ve asked the court to share with us (and our audience) who obtained the results ahead of time, when and how they obtained them, what efforts the court has undertaken to investigate the matter and whether it plans to take any further action regarding the matter.
In the event we receive a response from the court regarding our inquiries, we will update this story accordingly…
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UPDATE |
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According to several sources familiar with the situation, the results of the 2026 bar exam were obtained in advance by multiple parties after the supreme court uploaded the document to the internet prior to the date of its scheduled release. These sources reportedly accessed the document by manually entering a uniform resource locator (URL) address that was consistent with previous bar exam uploads.
The court reportedly took the document offline upon learning it had been accessed – but by then downloads of the results had already begun circulating throughout the legal community.
The court has not commented on the situation beyond its original statement.
“Definitely incompetence,” one source told us in describing the situation. “Not a conspiracy.”
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THE RESULTS…
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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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