South Carolina GOP panicking as pro-Trump lawyer creates party election 'chaos'

According to a report from Politico, pro-Trump attorney Lin Wood -- who had a hand in Georgia Republicans losing two seats in the U.S. Senate -- has jumped into Republican Party politics in South Carolina and local GOP leaders there don't know what to do about him.

Wood, who has latched onto QAnon conspiracies in his attempts to prove Donald Trump had the 2020 presidential election stolen from him, is attempting to be elected as the chair of the South Carolina Republican Party and he is using his army of rabid followers to make his move.

That, in turn, has the GOP leadership of the state fearful of the damage he will do to their party should he succeed.

According to Politico's Marc Caputo, "Wood, who transformed from a top Atlanta trial lawyer to a leading election conspiracy theorist in November, moved to South Carolina in February. Then the firebrand lawyer shocked the political establishment in one of the GOP's most important state parties by mounting an unexpectedly strong challenge to the incumbent chairman, Drew McKissick. The outcome has out-sized implications because of South Carolina's role in GOP presidential primaries — the state hosts the first primary in the South, and almost always votes for the eventual Republican nominee."

Speaking in Aiken earlier this week, Wood stated, "We need some chaos in the Republican Party in South Carolina. Somebody needs to shake it up. So here I am, Mr. Shaker."

Those comments, and Wood's history of outrageous statements, have local GOP leadership shook up.

After "Wood activists accused outgoing county GOP Chair Nate Leupp of rigging local party elections as they picketed the local party office and Leupp's place of employment, a Christian music store called Majesty Music," Leupp told Caputo, "There's a lot of crazy going on in South Carolina," before adding Wood's adherents are made up of "pitchfork- and torch-bearers."

"All the politicos are buzzing with the same question: what in the world is going on South Carolina? You just can't make this stuff up," Leupp explained. "Big personalities are using a national narrative about Trump to their own advantage."

Noting that 870 delegates are set to vote for the new chair, with McKissick's people believing they will win, Caputo reports that Wood is taking a page from the Trump playbook with his people already claiming the election will be rigged so he loses.

One of the men who recruited Wood to run, Jeff Davis, has already been spreading that accusation.

"Davis accuses the party establishment of 'cheating' by rigging the delegate process, a claim disputed by party officials. He said some county party officials have refused to follow party rules concerning delegate names and qualifications," Caputo wrote, with Davis claiming, "They are afraid because this will obviously have an effect on the 2024 election. In 2016, the establishment … did its damnedest to stop Donald Trump. I don't think the establishment wants another Donald Trump. South Carolina is first in the South. We have a lot of influence on who will be the nominee."

Former state party chair Chad Connelly fired back at Wood and his supporters by claiming, "They're not Republicans. They're not conservative. They're anarchists," before adding, "I've had clothes at the dry cleaner longer than Lin Wood has been a resident of South Carolina."

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