Reality Star Thomas Ravenel will drive to SC Governor | Palmetto policy

Thomas Ravenel, former South Carolina State Treasurer and Reality -Tv star, says he plans to run for governor of South Carolina next year, where he elbows into the state race by calling Cadre of current challengers “lightweight. “

“I run for governor of South Carolina, and none of the lightweight weights that are currently in the race Sent on social media Late 6 February. “I have a message that changes not only South Carolina but the whole country.”

Ravenel did not immediately return more requests for comment on February 7, but he made his statement to the top of his account on X, the social media site previously known as Twitter.

Earlier this month Ravenel hinted about his ambitions online and wrote on February 1: “I am thinking of coming back to politics” and specifically appoints the Governor’s race.

“We’ve had a terrible leadership at the governor’s position,” Ravenel wrote in this post. “We are one of the least competitive states in the southeast based on our extremely high counterproductive income tax rates. We also tax cars and boats and boat engines and the cost of extracting these taxes that hardly cover the income received.”

Ravenel, 62, has been waiting for a long time for the possibility of his conviction in a federal cocaine case launched while he was the chosen Republican Treasurer. He served 10 months in prison after pleading guilty to buying cocaine for himself and friends in 2007.

Ravenel defeated a nine period is up to win the office responsible for the state’s economy in 2006, but was only in office for about six months before he was indicted by authorities who had traced his drug use and the prestigious cocaine use in the bars , clubs and mansions in Charleston.

Shortly after his conviction, Ravenel shared his hopes for a day returning to the public office in an interview with the position and the courier. He also ran twice without success for the US Senate, first as GOP candidate in 2004 and a decade later as an independent candidate in 2014.

Filing for Gubernatorial Race does not officially open for more than a year, but when it does, it is expected to draw considerable interest and competition.

It will also be the first time South Carolina has had an open governor’s race since 2010, when 37-year-old Nikki Haley came victorious and made history when she was elected to the state’s first female governor.

Should Ravenel formally enter the race as a Republican (he calls himself a Libertarian in his social media profile), he is expected to squeeze against American representative Nancy Mace, R-Charleston, who is holding his own bid and has already begun to raise the state connect with Republican voters in addition to the lowcountry district that she has represented since 2020.

Like Ravenel, she also led a failed challenge against US Senator Lindsey Graham, Rs.C., for his Senate seat in 2014. But she ran as a Republican while Ravenel tried to seat Graham as an independent candidate.

Other potential challengers in 2026 Governor’s race include state attorney Alan Wilson and LT. Gov. Pamela Evette, among others.

Ravenel is the son of the late SC Congress Member Arthur Ravenel Jr., also known as “Cousin Arthur”, who spent some six decades of his life in public service, and for whom Charleston’s iconic wired stay Ravenel Bridge is named.

In recent years, Ravenel, earlier from Charleston, has moved to Aiken. In Charleston, he was known for being a reality -tv star in the first five seasons of Bravos “Southern Charm.”

In the wake of “Operation Lost Trust”, the FBI’s drug and bribery stitches from 1990 and bribery of the State House, legislators drafted a constitutional change in 1996 that made criminals and those convicted of election crimes not eligible for elected official in 15 years afterwards – which introduced a limit to a limit on how fast Ravenel could try to drive to the office again.

This is an evolving story. Check back for updates.