Democrat Joe Cunningham’s 51-49 win against Republican Katie Arrington in South Carolina’s 1st Congressional District was one of the biggest upsets of election night. However, if Republicans hoped that Arrington wouldn’t try for this 53-40 Trump seat again after her surprise defeat, her concession speech crushed those dreams. Arrington declared, "I am not done. You knock me down, it teaches me how to get up harder.” (Was she channeling Chumbawamba?) She added, “2020, it’s just a few years away. ... We have people up there in Washington that’ll hold the line until we can get back in 2020. I’m not going anywhere.”
Meanwhile, Arrington and other Republicans are having a loud debate about who is most to blame for what happened last week. On Tuesday, Arrington used a radio interview to torch the NRCC for not giving her enough support, saying that the committee “looked at me as in a safe district, and we kept telling them over and over again that Charleston County was a deep blue purple. And it is.” Arrington added that in 2020 “I know that I'll have the full support of the NRCC and the RNC going forward, without a doubt, got that.”
However, Arrington may be even more pissed at outgoing Rep. Mark Sanford, whom she unseated in the June primary. Sanford returned the favor by loudly and repeatedly refusing to endorse her, including during the final days of the race, and to call her out for trying to take back her support for oil drilling off the South Carolina coast. Arrington used her concession speech to blame Sanford and his allies for her defeat. Days later, Sanford published a New York Times op-ed where he wrote about why she lost.
Other local Republicans are also angry at Sanford, who never had a good relationship with the party establishment going back to his days as governor during the last decade and hasn’t made any more friends with his Trump bashing. State GOP Chairman Drew McKissick made sure to hit the departing congressman for his “poor taste and poor class” for refusing to back Arrington.
However, while Sanford doesn’t appear to have publicly expressed interest in trying to regain his seat next cycle, local politicos are very much acting like it’s a possibility. State Sen. Larry Grooms, who lost the 2013 special election primary to Sanford, is one of several Republicans who were mentioned by the Post and Courier as a possible candidate, and while he didn’t appear to rule anything out, he said that “whatever happens depends on what Sanford decides to do.” Another Sanford comeback seems very unlikely considering how much Trump hates him, but if there’s anyone who might try anyway, its Mark Sanford.
Perhaps luckily for the GOP, there are also other Republicans in this district who could run. Charleston County Councilman Elliott Summey recently told the Post and Courierthat he’s talking to consultants about a possible bid. In addition to Grooms, local Republicans mentioned state Sens. Chip Campsen and Tom Davis; Charleston GOP Chair Larry Kobrovsky; state Rep. Nancy Mace; Charleston City Councilman Mike Seekings; and 2018 gubernatorial candidate Catherine Templeton.