2020 Presidential Elections State-by-State Guide: Black-dominated South Carolina is also a Republican bastion
State
SOUTH CAROLINA
Primary date
The Democratic Primary will take place on February 29 (Saturday). The Republican Primary has been canceled and all delegates will commit to President Donald Trump.
Democratic delegates: 63 (54 pledged, nine super)
Republican delegates: 50
Governor
Henry McMaster (Republican)
Senators
Lindsey Graham (Republican) and Tim Scott (R)
Representatives: 7
Five Republican: Joe Wilson (2nd district), Jeff Duncan (3rd district), William Timmons (4th district), Ralph Norman Jr (5th district), Tom Rice (7th district)
Two Democratic: Joe Cunningham (1st district), James 'Jim' Clyburn (6th district)
Electoral college votes: 9
Donald Trump won all in 2016
How South Carolina has voted in past
One of the original 13 colonies, South Carolina became a state in 1788 and has taken part in every presidential election except 1864 because of the recession. It was a blue state through the early 1960s but then turned into a strong Republican bastion. After 1960, the Democrats succeeded in winning South Carolina only once in 1976. Even Barry Goldwater, who was humbled by LBJ in 1964, won the Palmetto State by a landslide. In 2016, Trump had a big victory over Hillary Clinton (55 to 41 percent).
South Carolina a GOP bastion
The Palmetto State's early influence was the slave majority, sugar-producing island of Barbados that produced its original settlers. Till 1855, the state was the only southern colony or state that had a black majority. The plantation owners of Carolina opened their colony to French Huguenots and Sephardic Jews and were slave masters of giant rice and indigo plantations.
Politically, the demographic changes have seen South Carolina move towards the GOP. There is division along racial lines and the majority of the whites make it challenging for the Democrats to win South Carolina. This is evident from the fact that the state has voted for Republicans in presidential elections almost every time since 1960, with the exception of 1976 when South's Jimmy Carter contested. Prior to the 2016 presidential election, pollings hinted at a tight race between Trump and Hillary Clinton but on the D-day, the former took home the trophy, even bettering Mitt Romney's 11-point win over Barack Obama in 2012. Trump's vote increased by a big margin that allowed the GOP to clinch SC in the 2016 presidential election.
South Carolina and the 2020 presidential election
The Democratic Party is witnessing a tight race increasingly turning in favor of Vermont's Bernie Sanders even though former vice president Joe Biden desperately needs to win the SC primary to keep his hope alive. In the GOP, the decision to cancel the primary was upheld by a judge after former South Carolina Republican congressman Bob Inglis sued the state GOP. He said the move deprived him and others "of the ability to vote for the candidate of their choice in South Carolina’s famous (and particularly influential) 'First in the South' primary."
South Carolina is a key state for it is the first state in the primary where the African-Americans play a decisive role. In 2016, the black voters made up roughly 60 percent of the total Democratic primary vote in SC (in the presidential election, they usually make up less than a quarter of the vote in the red state). Whoever wins the SC Primary will go into the Super Tuesday that follows on March 3 with massive momentum.