Abraham Kenmore, SC Daily Gazette

Four years ago, Sen. Penry Gustafson stunned political observers when she narrowly beat long-time Democratic incumbent Vincent Sheheen to flip the Senate seat that spans the Midlands to the North Carolina border. Now, a year after voting to block a near-total abortion ban, she’s fighting to fend off a GOP challenger.

Gustafson, R-Camden, is among 16 incumbent senators — just over a third of the 46-member chamber — facing an opponent in the June 11 primaries.

She faces a well-funded candidate who’s better known in an area of her district that’s grown since her 2020 upset. The Legislature’s post-census redrawing of voting lines put more of Lancaster County in the district and reduced its share of Kershaw County, where she’s from and previously served in the county GOP leadership. ...

COLUMBIA, South Carolina — President Joe Biden cruised to an expected victory Saturday in Democrats’ first recognized contest of 2024, following a month-long push by the president and his proxies to drive up turnout after the party put South Carolina first on the official voting calendar.

After The Associated Press called the race at 7:23 p.m., less than a half-hour after polls closed, the roughly 100 party faithful gathered at the South Carolina Fairgrounds chanted “four more years!”

With less than 30,000 votes counted, Biden was winning with 97% of them....

COLUMBIA — Two long-shot candidates excluded from South Carolina’s presidential primaries have filed separate lawsuits in federal court — one trying to get on the Democratic ballot, the other trying to kick former President Donald Trump off the Republican ballot.

Both have been rejected by their parties in South Carolina and face extremely long odds of winning their cases here.

But they’re undeterred. ...