The crowded Republican race to be South Carolina’s next governor has erupted into an early, all-out battle to secure Donald Trump’s coveted endorsement, with the candidates going to great lengths to grab the president’s attention 10 months before the primary.
That includes everything from personally sending him positive polls and employing his top allies to mimicking his signature catchphrases and policy proposals.
Seeking Trump’s endorsement is hardly a new phenomenon in Republican politics. But what’s notable is how South Carolina’s first open governor’s race in 15 years has so explicitly become a contest about winning the MAGA mantle, as opposed to the issues that once dominated politics in the state, according to interviews with a dozen Republican operatives, strategists and lawmakers.
And the GOP candidates in the ruby-red Palmetto State are hardly shy about admitting that.
“His endorsement is golden,” Rep. Ralph Norman, who launched his governor’s bid in July, told NBC News. “Why do you think everybody wants it?”
Trump has yet to back a candidate, but he raised eyebrows this week when he posted on Truth Social an internal poll from Rep. Nancy Mace’s campaign showing her leading the Republican gubernatorial field, which also includes Norman, Lt. Gov. Pamela Evette and state Attorney General Alan Wilson.
Trump did not come across the poll by chance.
Mace personally put her poll on Trump’s radar, according to a person close to Mace and another familiar person with the matter. Mace’s team also shared the results this week with multiple members of Trump’s team, before the president posted the survey on his social media platform.
“Nobody knows what’s going to happen with the endorsement,” the person close to Mace said. “But one thing is very clear to everybody in the race. This is first a race for an endorsement, and second, a race for governor.”
Some of Trump’s closest political allies in South Carolina are cautioning him to be patient as the open-seat race evolves, especially given that the race could include two stages. South Carolina primaries go to a runoff between the top two finishers if no candidate gets a majority in the initial vote.
Behind the scenes, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., a Trump golfing buddy, has been advising the president to stay on the sidelines of the primary race, at least for now, according to two GOP lawmakers. Gov. Henry McMaster, a Republican who was the first statewide elected official in South Carolina to endorse Trump during his 2016 campaign, has given similar advice to the president, according to a person with direct knowledge of those conversations. (McMaster is barred from running again because of term limits.)
Graham’s office declined to comment on his advice to Trump, though Graham described his thinking to reporters in the state earlier this month. McMaster’s office did not respond to a request for comment.
Making matters even more potentially messy for Trump, members of his orbit have spread themselves across the field, working for different candidates. Wilson’s campaign, for example, has brought on Mike Young, who was Trump’s North Carolina state director in 2024, and John Brabender, who created TV ads for the Trump campaign, according to two sources familiar with Wilson’s team.
“I do not believe the president is inclined to get involved in this race anytime soon,” Wilson told NBC News. “But I do believe there is an opportunity in the future for me to earn his support, and I’m confident that at some point in the future I will have that opportunity.”
‘Loyalty is the most important currency’
In the absence of a Trump endorsement, the candidates are vying to position themselves as his obvious choice.
For Evette’s campaign, that means showcasing her position at the forefront of efforts to challenge the 2020 election results, which Trump falsely claimed was stolen — a line he has picked back up in recent days.
And unlike some of her rivals in the race, Evette was an early Trump endorser in all of his presidential campaigns.
“Do not sleep on loyalty with the president. It matters more than people realize,” a GOP strategist involved in the race said. “Loyalty is the most important currency.”
Evette also enjoys strong relationships in Trump world, including with the president’s chief of staff Susie Wiles. Evette has Chris Grant and Andrew Surabian, two top Trump allies, working for her campaign.
But her team knows she needs to build her public profile and rise in the polls before Trump will commit to endorsing her, though they feel confident about her position, according to two sources familiar with the campaign.
Meanwhile, Mace’s splashy recent entrance into the race — and her intense efforts to lobby Trump — are forcing all the candidates, including Evette, to spend more money early.
Mace, who has a penchant for grabbing headlines, has been pitching herself as “Trump in heels" and held her first campaign town hall in the heart of Trump country.
She was critical of Trump after the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, and Trump even backed a primary challenger against Mace in 2022. But she has since hugged him tightly, and they traded endorsements in 2024.
Sources close to Mace believe she can win Trump over with two things he cares strongly about: positive polls and memorable TV hits.
“President Trump needs America First governors who will fight for him every single time,” Mace said in a statement. “No one will work harder to earn his endorsement.”
Mace also name-checked a trio of accomplishments that she says proves her “loyalty” to Trump: “taking on George Stephanopoulos and forcing a $15 million ABC settlement, pushing out (former United States Secret Service Director) Kim Cheatle after her failure to protect him, and personally helping the President secure his pick for Speaker.”
Mace, who worked on the 2016 Trump campaign, also has some Trump world folks working on her behalf, including Austin McCubbin, who worked on Trump’s 2024 team, and Mike Hahn, who has done digital operations for his campaign.
But even if she fails to secure an endorsement, Mace insists she won’t drop out of the race. “Governor or bust,” she told NBC News.
Norman, a member of the far-right Freedom Caucus and a real estate developer, also said he would “never” drop out of the race, even if he’s “dead last.” Norman has yet to ask for Trump’s endorsement, but he told NBC News he plans to make an appeal.
Part of Norman’s pitch to voters is creating a DOGE-style commission to examine spending at the state level, drawing on one of Trump’s ideas that was popular with the MAGA base.
He also has some notable figures from South Carolina Republican politics in his corner: former Gov. Nikki Haley, former Trump chief of staff Mark Meadows and Jim DeMint, the former senator and Heritage Foundation president. Norman told NBC News he expects most of the Freedom Caucus to also back his campaign.
But Norman’s endorsement of Haley for president in 2024 could hurt his chances of winning Trump’s approval, as could some early roadblocks he threw up against Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” this year, although he ultimately voted for it.
Norman, however, dismissed the idea that those actions could cut against him.
“In today’s world, it’s your record” that matters, Norman said. “I’ve been with Trump since Day One. I’ve never said a bad thing about him. And I won’t, even if he endorses somebody else.”
‘You have to earn his endorsement’
Like Norman, Wilson — who launched his campaign in June — says he had not yet spoken to Trump about his race or a possible endorsement but plans to in the near future.
Wilson has been approaching the matter indirectly in recent weeks: He’s had numerous conversations with members of Trump’s political team (“more than five, less than 20,” he said), and he acknowledged that allies have spoken favorably about his candidacy directly with Trump.
Wilson’s father, longtime Rep. Joe Wilson, R-S.C., is also friendly with Trump and is publicly urging the president to endorse his son, though he declined to discuss private conversations with the president.
And Wilson is close to Attorney General Pam Bondi, the former Florida attorney general, spurring hope among some of Wilson’s allies that she could help grease the skids for a possible Trump endorsement.
Wilson campaigned with Trump in New Hampshire during the 2024 primary, met with Trump at Mar-a-Lago in December and visited him in the White House earlier this year. His father, the longtime congressman, has been known to carry a photograph of himself with Trump in his jacket pocket. As attorney general, Wilson said he’s used his position to defend Trump.
Last year, Wilson said he attended Trump’s criminal trial in New York City, sat behind him in the courtroom and then blasted the “sham trial” at a news conference outside the court. After the 2020 election, Wilson signed onto an amicus brief backing a lawsuit challenging the results.
“Look, I’m not one of these people who thinks President Trump is going to give an endorsement easily in this race. I feel like you have to earn his endorsement,” Wilson said. “So my intent is to do everything I can to demonstrate that I’m worthy of his endorsement.”
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
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