LEXINGTON, S.C. — We’re less than a day away from polls being open for the June primary in South Carolina. One of the races News19 will be tracking as results come is the Senate District 23 Republican race.
On June 11th, Lexington residents will decide whether to re-elect current District 23 Senator Katrina Shealy or opt for one of her two challengers: Zoe Warren and Carlisle Kennedy.
“We have children that go to school hungry every day. That's a big push for me. I don't think children should be hungry. They can't learn if they're hungry. Teachers can't teach kids coming to school hungry,” Shealy said. "There're things that I think are important, but I want to work on what the constituents of South Carolina think are important. Their number one issue is illegal immigration. That's at the top of my list. I'm going to work on that."
New names on the ballot like Carlisle Kennedy hope to use his background in finance and law to benefit the people of Lexington.
“We got to make sure that we have enough money in the budget to properly fund our educators, our teachers, our staff, our janitors, our officers that work at the schools,” Kennedy said. "We got to make sure that the facilities are taking care. We've also got to make sure that we educate our students and not indoctrinate our students. There's a lot of issues that are talked about in school which are not necessarily they're not appropriate for certain age groups."
Zoe Warren, the third GOP candidate, hopes to tackle the inflation that’s impacted South Carolina.
“Regular folks are just really sick of the wacky woke, and they want their roads fixed,” Warren said. "They're just gasping for air right now, because of the runaway inflation, it's extreme, something has to be done so that we can kind of rein in some of these issues and maybe help people some tax relief because obviously, we know people are two people with two incomes are struggling to buy food right now. I can't imagine people on a fixed income."
Whether it’s the budget or repairing a broken system, each candidate has their priority but they all agree on improving the roads and infrastructure for Lexington residents.
"We're paying so much in taxes and our roads are a disaster. Our roads are broken and it's emblematic of broken systems, broken government systems. That service should be done, that's the key symbol of government,” Warren said.
If she makes her way back to the state house, Shealy says she’s already prepared new legislation she’d like to pass.
“What I want to continue doing is we need to make our laws stricter on human trafficking, child abuse, child neglect. human trafficking. People say that doesn't happen here in South Carolina. It does. You talk about Myrtle Beach, you talk about about I-95, I-20, I-77. Those interstates run right through South Carolina and where you have large interstates, that's where you have human trafficking. That's where you have child abuse," Shealy said.
Kennedy says as a new face in the State House, he would work to decrease government overreach.
“We saw this firsthand during corona and we've got to stand up and we got to represent our people here. So when things come down, like business closures, closing churches, mask mandates, vaccine mandates, we've got to look at the information and we got to do what's constitutionally correct,” he said.
Early voting has already begun with each candidate hoping to voters out to the polls.
“I'm going to continue to fight for the people of Lexington County, I'm going to fight for the people of South Carolina because I'm going to do what’s right. I have no other motive than to do what’s right for the people,” Shealy said.
Kennedy says he wants to “make our budget more conservative, make our legislature more conservative to represent your values, your principles and make positive change to bring it back to make our county even better."
Warren ensures an open door policy if elected, saying, “whether you’re a Democrat, Green Party or Republican, it doesn’t matter. We can talk about what your issue is, and the first thing I'm going to is try to understand what your issue is, an the next thing I'm going to do is filter through my worldview to try and find a solution to your problem.”
If no candidate gets at least 50 percent of the vote Tuesday, there would be a runoff between the top two vote getters later in the month.
