Even with a $100 million purse, the Harrison campaign still resorts to deception in their attempt to knock off Lindsey Graham

He has been pro-Trump since Day 1.  He opposes ALL abortions. He is against ALL gun control. He saves bald eagles. He is a small business owner. He thinks politicians want to take away our civil rights, our families, and our guns.

Now this sounds like a man many South Carolinians would want to represent them in Washington DC.  Yet 30 some days ago, most of us had never heard of Dr. Bill Bledsoe.  Bledsoe was the Constitution Party’s candidate for the U.S. Senate.  On October 1, 2020 Bledsoe dropped out of the senate race and endorsed Senator Lindsey Graham.  As with most ‘3rd party’ candidates Bledsoe barely showed up in the polls – if at all.  His campaign raised little money when compared to the reported 100 million dollars the Democrats will end up spending in an all-out assault on Republican Senator Lindsey Graham.

The Democrat candidate for U.S. Senate in South Carolina is Jamie Harrison.  There is no escaping him.  If you have a radio on for 15 minutes, you will hear a Harrison campaign ad.  The same is true when watching television.  Sometimes Harrison, or a supporting PAC, will have 3 commercials run during a single commercial break.  The fact that so much of the money to pay for all this campaign advertising is coming from out-of-state liberals is troubling.  It just doesn’t seem right – but these are the rules of the game right now and Harrison is taking full advantage of all of them.

Polling had been tight enough between July and October to keep the money pouring in for Harrison.  The money didn’t just pour in.  It was a hurricane of funding that shattered the previous mark for campaign money raised in a single quarter.  Beto O’Rourke, when running in Texas for the U.S. Senate in 2018, raised $38.1 million dollars in the 3rd quarter.  Jamie Harrison raised $57 million dollars in the 3rd quarter of 2020.  $57 million is an astonishing amount of money.  Spending nearly $100 million, in an attempt to win a U.S. Senate seat, is no way to have a representative form of government.  It might be time to consider caps on money that can be spent during a campaign.  Compare it to restrictor plate racing or salary caps for professional sports teams.  Our elected officials should be selected based on vision and merits, and not on the number of commercials and campaign signs produced. 

South Carolina candidates for elected office usually throw some elbows along the campaign trail.  In such a high stakes contest as Graham versus Harrison, the mud has been flying like a rooster tail coming off the 44-inch, rugged terrain tire of a 4×4 pick-up truck that’s floorboard deep in a Francis Marion National Forest mud puddle. Things have been getting dirty.  But approximately 3 weeks ago the Harrison campaign took nasty to a whole new level.  Along with the PAC’s supporting his campaign, Jamie Harrison began running campaign commercials that tout the former Conservative Party candidate for the U.S. Senate, Dr. Bill Bledsoe’s conservative credentials.  The commercials end with “Dr. Bill Bledsoe is too conservative for South Carolina”.  That’s like poking a bee hive and running!  Every real Republican in South Carolina knows there’s no such thing as being too conservative.  And he’s been pro-Trump since Day 1!

Another variation of the commercial ends with the advice to vote for what you believe in, vote your conscience.  It’s some slick trickery, is it not?  The question is how many votes will Bledsoe get, and if Lindsey Graham loses to Jamie Harrison, will the difference in votes between the Democrat and Republican be less than the number of votes that the Constitution Party candidate receives even though he is no longer in the race?  For example, if Graham loses by 5000 votes and Bledsoe received 6000 votes, the Harrison team will be laughing their asses off all the way to Washington DC.  And they’ll be laughing at the conservatives that took the bait – hook, line and sinker.

Dr. Bledsoe is not amused. On October 28, 2020 he issued a statement calling on Jamie Harrison and groups supporting Harrison, to cease and desist.  Bledsoe said, “I am no longer running for the U.S. Senate, and any effort to encourage people to support me is deceptive, underhanded, and wrong.” 

Bledsoe is correct.  The Harrison team has ignored the cease and desist request.  It may be karma that now carries Senator Graham across the finish line, along with Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and Barrett. 

As for Jamie Harrison; he ran a strong race, and then at the end he got talked into a scheme that might have went too far.  Tricking voters into voting for a candidate that is no longer in the race but still on the ballot is not very honorable.  In less than 24 hours we’ll find out if he crossed a line that voters cannot forgive.