On Tuesday, South Carolina residents will get to vote in their party’s primaries for statewide, countywide and city offices.
In South Carolina, where you are not required to register by party (a good thing), anyone can vote in the party primary of their choice.
By voting in a particular party’s primary, you are not obligated in any way to that party.
For the purposes of the primary election and any subsequent runoff, however, that’s the only primary you can vote in in this particular election.
When you go to the polling place, the poll worker will ask you which primary you want to vote in — Republican or Democrat.
Once you make the selection, they will send you to the proper voting booth.
If there happens to be a runoff between the top two candidates in any race, you can vote in the runoff if you voted in that party’s primary. If you voted in another party’s primary, you can’t vote in the runoff.
You can vote in a runoff even if you don’t vote in the primary according to Chris Whitmire, a spokesman for the S.C. State Election Commission. If you vote in one party’s primary, however, you can only vote in that party’s runoff.
It tends to be confusing, so we urge you to not only study the candidates, but also make sure which primary you want to vote in.
But, and this is very important for voters in the city of Florence, the city election for city council seats and mayor is “separate” from the other county or statewide elections.
So in the case of a voter in the city of Florence, they can vote in the city election in one party’s primary and the other party’s primary for other races.
In other words, you can vote in the Republican primary for a U.S. Senate candidate and go to the city of Florence voting booth and vote in the Democratic primary.
Or, you can do it the other way.
The important thing is that you do go and vote.
Because of the possible confusion, we urge you to think about your possible choices before you go and be prepared to tell the poll workers whether you want to vote in the Republican or the Democratic primary.
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