South Carolina Election Commission moves up candidate withdrawal deadline

Because of an adjustment made by the South Carolina Election Commission office, there is a new deadline for candidates to withdraw from local races across the state.

That withdrawal date has been updated to Friday, Sept. 16, at 5 p.m. - or one week from today - according to state Election Commission Deputy Executive Director Chris Whitmire, who spoke on Thursday with The Sumter Item.

Sumter County Voter Registration and Elections Director Pat Jefferson learned of the update on a Wednesday afternoon conference call with Whitmire and the state commission.

The previously reported date locally was Sept. 21 at 5 p.m.

Uniform candidate withdrawal dates are new to South Carolina in this year's election cycle, and Jefferson was going by the rules that were in effect for the June primaries, Whitmire said.

In all previous elections, the commission just handled any withdrawals on a case-by-case basis and did not have a uniform date.

In August, the commission notified the state political parties of the change to move the deadline earlier, he added.

The reason for the change to Sept. 16 is somewhat of a technical timing issue with the commission's election database creation for November and based on the possibility of a statewide race withdrawal affecting elections in multiple counties, Whitmire said.

The new uniform withdrawal deadline policy allows candidates to make a public statement of withdrawal in writing to remove their names from the November ballot.

The change obviously affects contested races with challengers, and in Sumter County, that is just the nine seats on Sumter School District's Board of Trustees and in Sumter City Council Ward 1.

Three candidates have withdrawn to date from the nine school board district races, trimming the total field to 27 candidates. As of Thursday, no one has dropped out of the city Ward 1 race, which still has five candidates.

Jefferson said she emailed all Sumter school board and city council candidates on Wednesday afternoon about the new deadline.

"Sept. 21 was the date we had at the beginning," she said, "but with the new update, I wanted everyone to know about them and for no one to be left behind."

The midterm election is Tuesday, Nov. 8.

The Item's Shelbie Goulding contributed to this report.