Will the Real Rusty Clevenger Please Stand Up?

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Voters in one of South Carolina’s largest counties will return to the polls on Tuesday (August 19, 2025) to choose a new sheriff after federal authorities allegedly forced incumbent Chuck Wright from office — sparking a special election capped by a last-minute political attack that backfired on live television.

After a bruising nine-way primary, the race for Spartanburg’s next sheriff is down to two candidates: County Coroner Rusty Clevenger — who has spent decades in Wright’s shadow — and former state trooper Bill Rhyne, who pitches himself as a break from the old guard.

To recap…

Wright, who ran the Spartanburg County Sheriff’s Office for the past two decades, styled himself as a Bible-thumping, tough-on-crime sheriff — until that image collapsed this spring, when federal subpoenas rained down on his subordinates, ordering them to testify before a grand jury.

Come April Fool’s Day, Wright was allegedly spotted conferring with longtime ally Trey Gowdy — a former solicitor and congressman — prior to announcing an abrupt leave of absence that effectively marked the end of his 21-year reign.

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“Effective immediately, I, Sheriff Chuck Wright, will be taking an extended leave of absence due to circumstances beyond my control,” the ex-sheriff wrote in a transfer-of-power letter obtained by FITSNews.

With a federal grand jury being impanelled, Wright drove off in his county-issued 2024 King Ranch pickup — a maroon-colored emblem of his taxpayer-subsidized extravagance — only to surrender it seven weeks later, when he was allegedly forced into an equally abrupt resignation.

In addition to widely publicized rumors of a pill dependency and documented excess on his county credit card, FITSNews uncovered something far more entrenched in Spartanburg County: a sprawling illegal gambling network once investigated by federal authorities.

According to at least two sheriff’s deputies, these back-door operations not only thrived under Wright’s tenure but, at his alleged direction, funneled cash into his campaigns — effectively bankrolling the very office that enabled them to grow.

All the while, Wright flaunted an extensive private arsenal including weapons he allegedly admitted to seizing from suspects — even as violent crime in Spartanburg outpaced Chicago’s per-capita rate, according to 2024 data from Neighborhood Scout.

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RELATED | POWER, PILLS AND PENDING CHARGES: THE FALL OF SHERIFF CHUCK WRIGHT

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Now, with a “constitutional sheriff” gone but his shadow still looming large, voters must decide whether his influence carries on through Clevenger or ends with him.

Clevenger, first elected coroner in 2009, has spent virtually his entire professional life orbiting Wright’s vortex — both in the sheriff’s office in the mid-1980s and, over the ensuing decades, becoming a fixture of the county’s law enforcement establishment in his own right.

While Wright stayed with the sheriff’s office his entire career, Clevenger left in the late 1990s to become an investigator with the seventh circuit — spending nearly a decade under Gowdy, who was later elected to congress and who now sits on Wright’s legal team.

Despite Gowdy’s proximity to Wright, Clevenger has highlighted own his ties to the former congressman on the 2025 campaign trail — all the while taking at least $3,000 in campaign contributions from Gowdy’s family and neighbors, further binding his bid to Wright’s most visible defender.

While on the same campaign trail, Clevenger has leaned heavily on his “large role” in the investigation and arrest of Todd Kohlhepp — the real estate agent later convicted for the 2003 Superbike Murders, a quadruple homicide that went unsolved for more than a decade.

While investigators had the public believing they were doggedly pursuing the case, at least one of its lead detectives — Allan Wood — was accused of romantically pursuing a Superbike victim’s widow, all the while purportedly padding his timecard on the way to a comfortable retirement.

FITSNews later obtained .eml files showing Wood wasn’t just neglecting his duties, but using his county-issued computer to circulate troves of pornography — including bestiality and graphic fetish content — to a select circle tied to the sheriff’s office.

One of his regular recipients was Clevenger, then employed by Gowdy at the solicitor’s office.

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With little help from these “investigators,” Kohlhepp confessed to the Superbike murders, and more, in November 2016. The bombshell dropped just five days before Wright faced voters in a hotly contested GOP primary, giving him a last-minute boost en route to his reelection.

Families of the Superbike victims have since turned sharply on Wright and Clevenger — and are now throwing their support behind Rhyne in the 2025 sheriff’s race.

“Rusty, you have to be the most unfit for any office, let alone sheriff,” wrote Tom Lucas, the father of Superbike victim Brian Lucas. “The Superbike case was totally screwed up from the start. You had nothing to do with solving it. Give credit to God Almighty for bringing justice.”

Lucas’ full statement can be viewed here.

“Spartanburg County Sheriff’s Office has to have a change of leadership,” added Melissa Brackman, the widow of Superbike victim Scott Ponder. “No one should want anyone who has been involved in some of the behind-the-scenes inappropriate behavior that went on.”

Brackman’s full statement can be viewed here.

Even as Lucas and Brackman condemn Clevenger for exploiting the Superbike case for political gain, some of his sharpest critics have come from within his own office.

Like Wright — who is infamous for showing up late to work or skipping it altogether — sources familiar with Clevenger’s tenure describe a coroner increasingly absent, rolling in later in the day and staying even less when he does bother to show up.

“The power has gone to Rusty’s head,” a former deputy coroner recalled. “When I was there, he’d walk in around noon, stay an hour or two, and then leave. You might see him three times a week… and whenever he was in the office, we’d give each other a heads up.”

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Deputy coroners also told FITSNews about repeated clashes over rulings on manners of death — including suspicious child fatalities and cases tied to law enforcement — where Clevenger allegedly overruled their findings in ways that appeared to shield both suspects and officers.

“What’s the point of going out and working a scene if Rusty’s just going to make up his own story anyway?” another former deputy coroner asked. “Why even send us out?”

FITSNews was further urged to “simply look” at the turnover under Clevenger’s leadership — noting the office is built for eight full-time investigators, but that seven have walked out in the past year-and-a-half, citing a host of problems tied to his management, or lack thereof.

“This man can’t even fully staff an eight-person team,” one said. “He can’t fill the one or two slots he’s been trying to fill for over a year. And he thinks he’s qualified to run a sheriff’s office with hundreds of employees? That’s got to speak volumes somewhere.”

These deputy coroners echoed the sentiments of sheriff’s deputies, who said it was widely understood Clevenger was “good friends” with both Wright and Wood — despite recent claims of barely knowing Wright or, in a remarkable twist, casting himself as a victim of Wood.

“Blaming someone for being on the receiving end of an email,” Clevenger said on the Freedom’s Fence Line podcast when pressed about Wood’s pornographic email chains, “is like blaming the victims of Ted Kaczynski for being victims… Ted Kaczynski was the Unabomber.”

“You can’t tell everything that’s going on all the time,” he added.

During that same episode, former co-host Bryan Alverson unexpectedly asked Clevenger about a command staff meeting deputy coroners had already described to FITSNews — where he told his office he had no plans to run for sheriff, only to announce his candidacy weeks later.

“After a lot of prayer, and one or two phone calls, one of which was from a former boss man of mine… part of that conversation that I had with him, along with another issue… is what made me know I needed to be in this race,” Clevenger said, limping through the surprise question.

A constituent later told FITSNews that before launching his bid, Clevenger privately confided he didn’t “want to get in that mess.”

While it remains unclear what ultimately prompted Clevenger’s decision to run, it has not gone unnoticed that elements of the same entrenched gambling network that flourished under Wright now appear to be working the ground on his behalf.

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At least one so-called “abandoned” gambling house in Inman — where sources reported activity as recently as 2020 — now sports a massive Clevenger for Sheriff sign out front. Despite its weathered exterior, the property is bristling with tiny surveillance cameras.

More on that another day…

Despite much of this information being readily available on FITSNews, Facebook and elsewhere, the Spartanburg chapter of the Fraternal Order of Police (FOP) endorsed Clevenger for sheriff on August 12, 2025 — billing the move as a unanimous decision.

Following that announcement, however, FITSNews was contacted by a lodge member who disputed the claim. According to the former officer, only 25 members — roughly 12.5% percent of the lodge’s membership — were present for the 6:00 p.m. weekday vote.

“They actually tried a vote on a Saturday several weeks ago and couldn’t get the two-thirds needed,” the member added. “So they waited a few weeks and tried again… The majority of those who did vote want Rusty to win due to his choice for deputy chief.”

Adding to the intrigue surrounding the FOP’s impartiality, Wright’s embattled son — Jared “Andy” Wright — had shared an FOP post on Facebook in late June announcing the lodge’s plan to endorse a candidate ahead of the election.

Andy had already stirred controversy the previous summer, when his father personally deputized him in what appeared to be an effort to salvage his expiring law-enforcement certification — a move that prompted an investigation by the S.C. State Ethics Commission.

The status of that inquiry — separate from the multi-agency criminal probes into Wright himself — remains unclear.

But if any moment defined Clevenger’s fate in this race, it wasn’t the shadow of Wright, the Superbike condemnations or even the whispers from inside his own office. It was a desperate, last-minute political attack that backfired spectacularly on live TV.

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RELATED | SPARTANBURG COUNTY EMPLOYEES WARN OF ESCALATING CYBER ATTACKS

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During a final televised debate on FOX Carolina, Clevenger opened with confidence — declaring that his opponent, Rhyne, did not vote for Donald Trump in 2024. The accusation echoed political texts and radio ads that had flooded Spartanburg earlier that week.

Just hours before going on stage, Clevenger had doubled down — posting what he claimed were Rhyne’s official voting records on Facebook to bolster the attack.

“My conservative credentials are unimpeachable,” Clevenger said, reading carefully from his notes and notably avoiding the camera. “I’m the only candidate on this stage who voted for Trump in 2024… I not only have the 40 years of experience, I have the right experience.”

There was just one problem: Clevenger was wrong.

Rhyne, when pressed on the accusation that he had been “untruthful” about his voting record, didn’t flinch. Instead, he spoke about running a clean campaign — reminding viewers that he and Clevenger had agreed not to make false claims against one another.

“And this attack came out,” the retired state trooper said, pulling two papers from a black binder. “At 3:35 this afternoon, the election’s commission from the State of South Carolina corrected their mistake. I brought the information with me to show.”

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As Rhyne held up his certified voting history for the cameras, he drove the point home: “That was unchecked information. Non fact checked information. Came after me on something that was absolutely not true and I have the evidence to prove that. So absolutely, I did vote.”

After being caught peddling categorically false information on the campaign trail, Clevenger didn’t apologize. Instead, he demanded the county’s elections department issue a statement — adding that he hoped “a lesson was learned” by agencies tasked with overseeing elections.

While he closed with a promise to revise campaign materials, constituents across Spartanburg County continued receiving fresh mailers throughout the week and into the weekend — displaying incorrect voting records and falsely accusing Rhyne of not voting for Trump.

In a campaign already dogged by contradictions, the false attack ads laid bare the irony of Clevenger’s reputation as an “investigator” — a man who stood beside Wright for decades yet somehow missed what deputies had recognized as corruption as early as 2004.

On Tuesday, voters will decide whether to take the first step toward closing the book on Wright’s era — or extend it through his longtime ally. Either way, his network still lingers throughout the sheriff’s office and beyond, and dismantling it won’t happen overnight.

This story may be updated.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR…

Andrew Fancher is a Lone Star Emmy award-winning journalist from Dallas, Texas. Cut from a bloodline of outlaws and lawmen alike, he was the first of his family to graduate college which was accomplished with honors. Got a story idea or news tip for Andy? Email him directly and connect with him socially across Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.