SOUTH CAROLINA, USA — Tuesday night, political newcomer Carlisle Kennedy upset longtime Lexington County Senator Katrina Shealy, significantly shifting the South Carolina Senate.
This election result means only one of the five 'sister senators' who stood together to vote against the 6-week abortion ban will remain in the Senate.
The 'sister senators' earned their name in May 2023 when they filibustered against the bill that would make abortion illegal after six weeks.
Now, only Margie Bright Matthews will be returning for the next session. Sandy Senn, Penry Gustafson, and Katrina Shealy lost their seats, while Mia McLeod did not seek re-election.
With these changes, South Carolina's Senate now has only two female senators: Margie Bright Matthews and Tameika Isaac Devine.
"With the three Republican women being beat in the primaries this year, it is devastating for our state," said Senator Penry Gustafson, who is spending her final days at the State House after voters ousted her.
"If you don't have anybody to champion a particular issue, a particular group of people, we're talking about more than half the people of our entire state, it's not going to be good for us, it will not benefit us," Gustafson said.
Chase Meyer, a political science professor at the University of South Carolina, sees this as a significant development for the future of women's issues in the state. "If anything, this is a big warning sign to all Republicans for where they need to be when it comes to abortion rights," Meyer said.
"Before these primaries, only 15% of our entire state legislature were female - that's near the bottom. The only states worse were Mississippi, Tennessee, and West Virginia," Meyer said.
Gustafson emphasized the impact of Shealy's loss on the Senate's seniority and the representation of women's issues. "It's going to be a minimum of 15 years before a woman could serve as head of a committee, let alone if it's the right woman."
Senator Tameika Isaac Devine, who will be one of the two women in the Senate next session, expressed her commitment to continuing the fight for women's rights.
"The thing about it is, that having our voices at the table is necessary because we bring a unique perspective, but I don't want people to think because we’re women, it’s always going to be a woman's issue," Isaac Devine said. "Women's issues are families' issues, family issues are communities' issues, and community issues are S.C. issues. For me, it's more of a rallying cry and incentive to keep the fight going and be vocal with the issues we're bringing forward because there are less of us to raise those issues."
Meyer explained that those who vote in primaries and runoffs are typically the most committed and informed but also the most ideologically extreme voters, meaning abortion was likely top of mind.
"These ladies were targeted, I mean point blank, period. They we're targeted because they came up here and fought for their values. They didn't think about the party; they thought about people, and we're elected to represent people," Isaac Devine said. "Whether you're Republican, Democrat, you know we are here to represent people and those women did that and they were targeted and taken out."