Presidential campaign is coming to S.C.

In Tuesday’s Democratic primary, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders beat former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton by the widest margin in the history of the New Hampshire primaries. On the Republican side, billionaire Donald Trump received nearly as many votes as the next three candidates combined.

And yet, despite those commanding victories, everything could change as the campaigns move to South Carolina this week.

The contest in New Hampshire, which closely followed the Iowa caucuses, did its job of winnowing candidates in the overcrowded Republican field. The day after the primary, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and former Hewlett-Packard head Carly Fiorina announced that they were suspending their campaigns.

And it’s hard to see how retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson carries on after finishing last with 2.3 percent of the GOP vote, although he still is polling well in South Carolina.

Yet when the votes were tallied, the race in both parties seemed almost as uncertain as before New Hampshire. Ohio Gov. John Kasich finished second in the Republican primary to win bragging rights as the Granite State’s choice as top “establishment” candidate.

But he got less than 16 percent of the vote, which Trump more than doubled. And Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, another “outsider” candidate, came in third.

Can any of the candidates favored by the party insiders – Kasich, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush or Florida Sen. Marco Rubio – put together a coalition capable of winning the nomination? South Carolina will begin to offer an answer to that in Saturday’s Republican primary.

South Carolina voters also will help decide whether Sanders’ popularity is confined to states with largely white populations and Democrats with a liberal bent. Both Clinton and Sanders already have begun vigorously courting African-American voters in advance of South Carolina’s Feb. 27 Democratic primary.

Democrats will hold a primary in Nevada on Saturday, and Republicans will hold their Nevada primary the following Tuesday. But South Carolina will be where the real action is this month.

York County, in fact, has been privileged to play host to nearly all the candidates from both parties, many of them more than once. Winthrop University was the site of a nationally broadcast Democratic forum in November that featured both Sanders and Clinton, as well as former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley, who dropped out of the race after the Iowa caucuses.

Local voters not only have had a chance to hear what the candidates had to say, but, in many cases, to walk up and shake their hands.

It often is said that voters don’t focus on elections until the last minute. Well, the last minute has arrived.

South Carolina’s Republican voters have less than a week to make up their minds, and Democrats have less than two. But, with both primaries being held on a Saturday, once they have decided, they should have no problem finding time to cast a ballot.

The so-called “First in the South” primaries are a boon to South Carolina, in respect to both politics and economics. The state attracts candidates with their swarms of advisers, assistants, campaign workers and other hangers-on.

They buy ads on the state’s media. They eat in local restaurants, sleep in the state’s motels and shop in its stores. And for much of the month of February, they focus the attention of the nation on the Palmetto State.

But during this time, South Carolinians also have the benefit of being in the vortex of the presidential selection process and playing a key role in deciding the eventual winners of the parties’ respective nominations.

Enjoy it now, because it’s fleeting. Once the primary winners are decided, we’re not likely to see the candidates any time soon – even during the general election. South Carolina hasn’t backed a Democrat for president in 40 years (Jimmy Carter, 1976), and both parties know that.

This is your chance to influence the future of the nation. Don’t waste it.

This story was originally published February 16, 2016 at 12:03 PM with the headline "Presidential campaign is coming to S.C.."