Incumbent Maggie Wallace Glover of Florence and challenger Kent Williams of Marion will meet in a runoff in two weeks to determine once and for all who will represent District 30 in the South Carolina Senate for the next four years.

Glover collected 6,227 votes in Tuesday’s Democratic primary, followed by Williams with 6,011 votes. Tim Norwood finished third with 5,157 votes. A total of 17,372 people voted as compared to the 17,755 who voted in the original primary June 8.

Glover said she was pleased to see she retained the support she had in the first primary in Tuesday’s primary.

“It’s pretty much the exact same results as the June 8 primary,” Glover said.

“I’m happy to have finished first and will be working as hard as I can in the next two weeks before the runoff, really just trying to educate the general community to have them truly understand that there is not one senator in this state that actually brings a job to his or her county, not one,” she said. “I work to build infrastructure and a better educational system - things that allow us to make our area more attractive to bring in good paying jobs. That’s the economic development I’m working on.”

Williams said he, too, is excited about the runoff and believes Tuesday’s primary results prove the residents of District 30 want a change in leadership.

“It’s very humbling that people believed in Kent Williams, believed he was the man for the job and stuck by him,” he said. “I’m just happy to be here, happy to be in the runoff and happy for the people of District 30 because they now have the opportunity to bring in new leadership. And with the help of the good Lord, we plan to be that leadership.”

Norwood said he was disappointed with the outcome of the primary, but felt good about his campaign.

“One principle I’ve always lived by is I don’t want to look back and wish I’d done things differently,” he said. “We ran a fabulous campaign. We did everything you’re supposed to do to win. Unfortunately, it just didn’t work out. But looking back I can say there’s nothing I wish I’d done differently.”

Norwood said when the campaign first began, he planned to endorse one of his opponents if he lost. That, however, has changed.

“My opponents have made this so personal and ugly with their attacks on me,” he said. “So I can’t publicly support either one of them based on the way they’ve behaved in the last three weeks. I wish them both well. Let them go at it.”

In primary elections with more than one candidate, one of the candidates must have at least 50 percent, plus one vote, of the ballots cast in order to avoid a runoff. In Tuesday’s primary, Glover finished first but only had 35.7 percent of the vote.

Glover and Williams will meet in the runoff Oct. 12.

Tuesday’s new primary marked the culmination of months of controversy in the Senate District 30 race, a controversy that began as soon as the votes were counted for the June 8 Senate District 30 Democratic primary.

While Glover took first place in the race with 35 percent of the vote, the initial election night count showed a dead heat between Norwood and Williams, with Norwood ahead by seven votes. The June 9 certification of the election results, however, produced a different result, with six votes separating Norwood and Williams.

According to state law, a mandatory recount of the vote must be held by individual county election commissions if less than 1 percent of the total vote separates two candidates. On June 12, the election results were sent to the state Election Commission for certification, which ordered the mandatory recount.

The recount was held June 14 and again, the results differed. This time, the count showed Williams ahead of Norwood by six votes.

Meanwhile, Williams filed an election protest with the S.C. Democratic Party, alleging several instances of voter fraud and irregularities in the counting of absentee ballots. Norwood filed a protest of his own, and was heard June 16 after Williams withdrew his protest.

Based on evidence presented by Norwood, the Executive Committee of the state Democratic Party voted 18-3 to void the results of the June 8 primary, and ask Gov. Mark Sanford to order a special election. The committee voted to turn over all the evidence presented by Norwood to the State Law Enforcement Division for investigation.

Since the executive committee made its decision, Williams and Glover filed petitions with the S.C. Supreme Court, asking it to throw out the party’s invalidation of the election. They asked the court to order a runoff election between them. The Supreme Court refused to hear either of the petitions.

Glover also filed suit in federal court, alleging violations of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, violations of the Due Process and Equal Protection clauses of the U.S. Constitution and violations of the 14th and 15th Amendments of the U.S. Constitution.

District Judge Terry L. Wooten granted summary judgment for the defendants in the suit, the primary of which was the S.C. Democratic Party, ruling that the record fails to reflect any “denial or abridgement” of the right of any citizen’s right to vote.

“If a new primary is held, all eligible citizens will once again be afforded the right to vote for the candidate of their choice,” Wooten said. “Each of the plaintiffs who testified in this case indicated that they would vote in any new election set. There has been no showing by the plaintiffs that they or others would be denied the right to vote on account of their race and/or color in a new primary election.”

Let us know what you think of this story | Send us a letter to the editor