The announcement Sunday morning of U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham’s sudden death immediately reshaped South Carolina politics, throwing the race for his Senate seat wide open — and Nancy Mace appears to be eyeing a return.
Mace, a South Carolina congresswoman, recently suffered a bruising defeat in June’s GOP primary for governor, finishing last after drawing just 12 percent of the vote.
Still, by Sunday morning, several reports suggested Mace was weighing whether to jump back into the political spotlight and pursue the newly vacant Senate seat.
Under the process now set in motion, Gov. Henry McMaster, who is term-limited, will appoint a temporary successor to Graham. That person would then have to compete in both a primary and a general election to secure a full term in the U.S. Senate.
Mace hinted at the possibility herself, sharing a clip of Michael Corleone from The Godfather: Part III alongside the famous line, “Just when I thought I was out… they pull me back in…” But the prospect of another Mace campaign quickly drew skepticism from some conservatives.
President Donald Trump, meanwhile, suggested during an appearance on NBC’s Meet the Press earlier Sunday that he already had a potential successor in mind. He declined to name the person, saying it was too soon out of respect for Graham, once a primary rival and later a close ally, friend and golf partner.
“I have somebody that I think would be great. But I don’t want to say it now because, you know, it’s too soon with Lindsey,” Trump told Meet the Press moderator Kirsten Welker.
Mace participates in a hearing on Capitol Hill on April 29, 2026, in Washington, DC
Lindsey Graham and President Donald Trump golf together on November 15, 2025
‘I don’t want to even talk about anybody. But I do have somebody that I think is really good,’ Trump added.
Mace’s former Republican House colleague and convicted fraudster, George Santos, wrote sarcastically on X, ‘Do it! Please I need more s**t posting content.’
Conservative author and American Majority CEO Ned Ryun, son of former Kansas Congressman and Olympic runner Jim Ryun, noted on X that no one was pulling Mace into the race.
‘Rational people might think, I just got DEAD LAST in a 5 way statewide primary a few weeks ago. Maybe the people of SC don’t want me to represent them. Maybe I should hang it up,’ Ryun noted, before adding that the outgoing representative was ‘apparently preparing herself for another walk of shame.’
Mace’s fellow House GOP colleague Joe Wilson, 78, the most senior Republican in the South Carolina congressional delegation, was another name floated as Graham’s replacement, but he has opted himself out.
Wilson’s political campaign account posted on X on Sunday morning that he had spoken to President Trump, when he let him know that his ‘goal is to remain in the House to keep his two-vote majority for the American people!!!’
Wilson’s adopted son, Alan, is likely to be the state’s next governor after beating current Lieutenant Governor Pamela Evette in the GOP runoff last month.
Evette herself could also be floated for the Senate posting, after garnering just over 30 percent of the vote in the runoff election for governor against Alan Wilson.
She was the top vote-getter in the state’s primary but was unable to coalesce support from the rest of her former primary field in the runoff.
A list of potential Graham successors floated by Politics1 also included Congressman Ralph Norman, who also ran in the GOP gubernatorial primary, as well as former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley, who previously served as the state’s governor.
Mace would bring significant baggage into the Senate race, aside from a poor performance in the June primary.
She became a major thorn in Trump’s side during her push to release the Epstein files in the US House of Representatives during the last year.
Mace has also been accused of being a difficult boss and of mistreating her own staff, and she was even filmed in a heated altercation with Charleston airport staff in her home state of South Carolina.
The office of Graham, who had represented South Carolina since 2002, announced in the early hours of Sunday that the senator had, ‘passed away from a brief and sudden illness.’
A 911 call for ‘cardiac arrest’ was placed from Graham’s residence around 8.30pm, but no official cause of death has been confirmed, according to multiple reports.
