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South Carolina senator Mia McLeod – who made waves last month when she bailed on the S.C. Democratic Party (SCDP) – is refuting the contents of a story which ran in The (Columbia, S.C.) State newspaper last weekend.
In an email to her supporters on Tuesday, McLeod took umbrage at the report – which according to her was published by “the same newspaper that has for years, consistently gone out of its way to make me seem insignificant.”
According to McLeod, the story – written by reporter Joe Bustos – put words into her mouth and was full of “speculative and anonymous contributions.”
The report specifically claimed McLeod left the party in an effort to effectuate a change in its leadership – an allegation she aggressively refuted.
“I’ve publicly left the SCDP, remember?” McLeod said. “If nothing changes, doesn’t matter who’s captain of the Titanic … it’s still the Titanic.”
Good point … not to mention an accurate one.
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McLeod proceeded to embark on a blow-by-blow refutation of Bustos’ story, calling out Democratic leaders who criticized her and highlighting the defeat of five black Democrats – Krystle Matthews, Anne Parks, Kimberly Johnson, Shedron Williams and Chardale Murray – in the November 2022 election.
According to McLeod, these losses – which occurred in districts the S.C. Republican Party (SCGOP) didn’t even target – offered “further proof of the plight of strong, independent-minded black women within this S.C. Democratic Party.”
“I can think of several others who were vying for seats at different levels of government and have suffered the same fate for the same reasons,” she wrote.
McLeod’s email also made it abundantly clear she had no intention of tempering her criticism moving forward.
“If the state party continues to be disingenuous and deflect, I’ll keep putting the truth out there for the people because the SCDP can’t keep calling itself the ‘Big Tent’ Party if party establishment leaders are the only ones under the tent,” she wrote.
McLeod, 54, of Bennettsville, S.C. campaigned unsuccessfully for the Democratic nomination for governor in 2022 – losing to eventual nominee Joe Cunningham in a race which was marred by allegations of institutional suppression of minority turnout.
No Democrat has won a top-of-the-ticket race in the Palmetto State this millennium. The last person to do it? The late Fritz Hollings, who defeated GOP congressman Bob Inglis in 1998 to win his final term in the U.S. Senate. Meanwhile, no Democrat has won a statewide election in South Carolina since 2006 – when Jim Rex defeated Karen Floyd in the race for state superintendent of education by fewer than 500 votes.
Rex also bolted the Democratic party, incidentally …
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR …
Will Folks is the founding editor of the news outlet you are currently reading. Prior to founding FITSNews, he served as press secretary to the governor of South Carolina. He lives in the Midlands region of the state with his wife and seven children.
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1 comment
I am unimpressed with McLeod, who does not respond to my emails or phone calls, even though I live in her district. She appears to be close-minded to opinions other than her own. I was unable to open discussions with her about two illegal school board members in Richland 2 or grossly improper actions by the board of directors of The Summit HOA. Her email auto-response claims she reads each email, but does she?