Tommie Reece Hopes Persistence Pays Off in Senate 6

A lot of people in Tommie Reece’s shoes would have given up. Less than a week before the June 12 Republican primary the South Carolina Supreme Court ruled that she could not appear on the ballot due to a discrepancy in her candidate filings. But Reece did not abandon her effort to unseat incumbent Mike Fair.

“I’m not the kind of person who gives up easily,” Reece said. “Especially when something doesn’t seem right and I had so many people supporting me.”

Reece had to redouble her efforts and gather enough signatures and try to qualify via petition, which she did quite easily.

Getting the signatures proved to be a source of motivation. “We ended up with 3,600 signatures, which was more than the incumbent received in the primary,” Reece said. “So that really gave us strength and we knew we had support.”

In talking to voters during the primary season, the petition drive and now, in the general election, Reece detected a frustration among the electorate, which only grew when hundreds of candidates were purged from ballots across the state.

“There are people who are just fed up in general and with this incumbent in particular, who has been in Columbia a long time and does not have much to show for it,” Reece said, referring to Fair. “But, certainly from an economic development standpoint people don’t think we’re where we ought to be.”

The Senate District 6 race bears a strong similarity to the race in neighboring District 7, where long-time incumbent David Thomas did not even make it into a run-off. Thomas took office in 1984. Fair also went to Columbia in 1984, first as a House member ands then in 1995 as a Senator.

Reece, who was elected to the Greenville County School Board of Trustees four times, said that voters she speaks to think the state can do better.

“You look at the levels at which education is being funded, the state of our roads and bridges, it’s not hard to see there is a problem. And all the problems with the pension system and SCDOT,” Reece said. “While those things have been ignored, at the same time an awful lot of legislators have done things to help themselves.”

“People realize that if you keep sending the same people back to Columbia none of these problems will get fixed.”

Reece knows getting elected would be an upset. One of the biggest disadvantages to being a petition candidate is in fund-raising. A candidate who wins a primary has two rounds of fundraising—meaning they can have donors give the maximum amount twice. Considering that, Fair’s edge in fund-raising through the last reporting period was not insurmountable. He has out-raised Reece $112,224 to $31,375.

The plain-speaking Reece doesn’t dwell on the fund-raising totals.

“Educating people on how to vote for a petition candidate is one of our priorities now,” she said. “We need people to consider each office and not just vote straight party.”

That’s no small feat since roughly half of voters do so.  But, this election cycle petition candidates get a bit of a break. Party listing rotates with every new cycle and this time around, petition candidates will be right next to the Republican candidate on the ballot—unless there is a Libertarian Party member, which in the case of Senate 6 there is not. It’s not the ideal situation for Reece, but it will have to do.

“The playing field is not completely level, but candidate against candidate we think we have a chance,” Reece said.

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