Incumbent Representative R.J. May is running for reelection in House District 88

South Congaree, SC 06/08/2024 (Paul Kirby) – Incumbent Representative R.J. May is running for reelection in House District 88. District 88 covers both South Congaree and Pine Ridge, a large portion of Red Bank, and across I-20 up to East Main Street in Lexington. On the other side it abuts I-26 near the Charleston Highway interchange, runs southward to cover the Gardners Terrace Road portion of the town of Gaston, up to SC Hwy. 6, and encompasses the Edmund Community.

May has served for 4 years and is a founding member of the S.C. Freedom Caucus. The Freedom Caucus is a group of legislators that believe that the US Constitution should be interpreted literally. May and the other members are also 100% pro-life, pro Second Amendment, and feel as if less government is the best government. They don’t believe that South Carolinians should be footing the bill for the pet projects of the members of the House or Senate and are against providing incentives to lure multibillion dollar, worldwide corporations to locate in our State.

Many of the growing Freedom Caucus’s members are being opposed this year by candidates that were selected and financed by the State’s Republicans that make up the Old Guard or RINOs. The word RINO is an acronym for Republicans in Name Only. The Old Guard is made up of the most powerful men of South Carolina. They can best be described as the leadership of the House and Senate that have built enough prestige and seniority over the years to control committee assignments, the legislative calendar, and more. For members of the legislature to get good committee assignments, members request money (earmarks) for their districts, and other perks that help members get reelected year after year, they need to vote on what the Old Guard tells them to when they are told.

May said recently that he and the other members of the Freedom Caucus simply buck the Old Guard and that’s why they are being so viciously attacked with mailers, text messages, phone calls, and in other forms of advertisements during this election cycle. “We don’t vote on a State Budget that’s filled with member’s request that has nothing to do with the mission of the State,” May stated. “We don’t vote for legalized abortions, we don’t vote for bills that would restrict our right to keep and bear arms, we don’t vote to give Scout Motors (a division of Volkswagen) $1.3 billion of SC taxpayers money to build electric offroad vehicles here, or anything else we find to be an abuse of your money.”

Between the time that a draft of a new year’s State budget is introduced and the time that budget is passed into law, it changes drastically according to May. “We first vote on the new budget line by line. There’s a record of these votes online that shows how every member of the legislature votes. That’s easy to find. Then, the budget gets packed by many of the legislators with these members request and that’s brought back to us for another vote on the entire thing. This year, that version includes $300,000 for the Charleston Wine and Cheese Festival, $250,000 for the SC Horse Council, and $25,000,000 for the Town of Fort Mill’s Downtown Economic Development,” he said. “In my opinion, some of the items on that list are worthy of State financing however, if they are worthy, they need to be debated in the State budget when we go through that process. It forces us to vote against the entire budget that includes worthy parts. But the bad outweighs the good. As a Republican Supermajority, we shouldn't fund the left's priority, we shouldn't give away billions of taxpayer dollars to private corporations, and we shouldn't waste nearly a billion on earmarks. The RINOs are only telling you a part of the story when they attack us.” Each year, I vote against the State budget because of this and now Freedom Caucus members are being hammered because we vote against the entire budget that includes worthy parts like SROs for our schools, teachers pay raises, and those kinds of things. The RINOs are only telling you a part of the story when they attack us.”

When asked if large industries like Scout Motor’s would still come to SC and bring all their high paying jobs with them without large taxpayer incentives, May said, “Volkswagen, the parent company of Scout Motors, is the second largest car manufacturer in the world. $1.3 billion is really a drop in the bucket to them. When they choose where to build a new plant, they look at many things. They look at whether a location has a large, trainable workforce. They also look at interstate highways, ports, available tracts of land, and those type of things. There are studies that have shown that giving these types of companies large incentives plays almost no part in their decision to locate in a State.”

Likewise, other industries that SC chooses to subsidize include the film industry. “Again, there are studies that show that subsidies to this industry in other states have reduced the amount of film footage shot in those states over time, not increased it. Movies like Forrest Gump, The Lords of Discipline, The Great Santini, and Days of Thunder were all shot in SC prior to the time we began subsidizing the film industry,” he concluded.

When asked why it was so important to have no training included in the Constitutional Carry Bill the legislature passed last year, May quickly answered “Saying the Second Amendment reads, a well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed. What It doesn’t say is that you’ll need anything from the State for you to do this. If we let the State require training, what else will they require training for. If a grown adult wants to drink a beer after cutting his grass, will he need to have training for that? If we let the government begin taking our liberties, where will it end.

May pointed out several things about his opponent Lorelei Graye. One was a document obtained through a Freedom of Information request that showed that Graye had never voted in a Republican Primary. This would indicate that she had very little interest in Republican politics and Conservative causes until this election cycle. “Lexington County property records show that she hasn’t lived in District 88 a full year,” May said. “She bought a home on Wilson Street in Red Bank from Senator Shealy’s family in the summer of 2023,” May pointed out. “Within months, she made it known she was running against me for House.”

He also noted that she leans very Liberal on some important issues. “She has publicly said that she is a supporter of both DEI and ESG,” May said. DEI stands for diversity, equity, and inclusion while ESG stands for environmental, social, and governance.

Critics of DEI say that these programs attempt to solve racial discrimination by disadvantaging other groups. In short, it’s close to what once was called reverse discrimination. In DEI, a person who applies for employment may legally receive a lower score of their abilities because of the color of their skin, not their education or their ability to do the best job.

ESG is an acronym for environmental, social, and governance. It’s most often used to judge businesses on their environmental impact, their social activities, and their position on governance. It gives a business an ESG ranking based on the things listed above and can make it legal to discriminate against that business. If a business is given a low ESG score because they make and sell firearms, a bank could legally refuse to do business with them because Progressives believe that firearms are bad and shouldn’t be made. Both of these programs or pets of the far left and conservative states like Texas have already moved to make this “grading on a curve” illegal.

In closing May said, “Tuesday, you have the opportunity to make your choice known when you vote. Do you want a closeted Liberal working for you or would you rather have a proven Conservative continuing the fight. It’s very simple. If you want someone in Columbia who is fighting to drain the swamp and stop the good ole’ boy politics, vote R.J. May on Tuesday, June 11th, 2024.”

If you’d like to speak with R.J. May, you can reach him by phone at (803) 470-4482. You can also reach him by email at voterjmay@gmail.com.