Recounts confirm ousting of SC majority leader, narrow win of Greenville County Republican

COLUMBIA — The Republican legislator recently chosen to lead the House GOP Caucus officially lost his re-election bid with recount results certified Wednesday, while a second House Republican held on by less than three dozen votes.

Official results show Democrat Joe Madge, a 59-year-old engineer at tire manufacturer Continental, defeated House Majority Leader Micah Caskey, an attorney, by 106 votes out of more than 14,400 ballots cast.

Of the 10 state House Republicans ousted as part of a blue tsunami that swept the nation, Caskey’s loss in a Lexington County district considered deep red was arguably the most surprising.

Four years ago, Caskey barely survived a challenge from his right flank, winning a GOP primary by just 25 votes over an opponent who accused the former prosecutor of not being conservative enough. No Democrat challenged him that November. Then, in 2024, Caskey trounced his Democratic challenger by nearly 21 percentage points.

The final tally this week declared Madge the winner with 50.3% of the vote.

Responding on social media, Caskey said he called Madge to congratulate him Wednesday.

“The people have made their choice, and I respect it fully,” the 10-year incumbent wrote on X. “The seat has never belonged to me. It belongs to the people of Cayce, Springdale, and West Columbia, and it has been the honor of my life to hold it in trust for you.”

The Marine veteran added, “I learned long ago in the Corps that service is not a title. It is a way of living, and it doesn’t end when the uniform comes off or when an election is over.”

His loss means the House GOP Caucus will need to choose a new leader. The caucus just elected him majority leader in August to replace Davey Hiott of Pickens, who didn’t seek re-election.

Madge, who grew up in Washington, D.C., and a tiny Upstate New York town on Oneida Lake, moved to Lexington County in 1995. It’s been his home since, other than a three-year stint in Puebla, Mexico, with his job starting in 2003.

Madge said he decided to challenge Caskey, a 45-year-old Columbia-area native, because he was “tired of being angry” about what legislators were doing.

“They just really weren’t focused on the things that would help people out in their daily lives, and instead of just being mad all the time, I said, ‘Well, let me see if I can run for office. Maybe I can help change things,’” he told the SC Daily Gazette.

Madge, chairman of the Lexington County Democratic Party from 2018 to 2022, said he figured a Democrat could get at least 45% of the vote in a blue wave midterm and went door-to-door in an effort to draw support from people who don’t normally vote.

He said he’ll advocate for finding consensus on issues that should be nonpartisan priorities.

“Now between Republicans and Democrats, we may have different approaches to those things, but that’s the appeal I want to try and make,” he said.

“Can we focus on the things that the voters want to see us work on — reducing healthcare costs, improving our education system, fixing our roads and bridges?” he continued. “I think everybody wants to do those things. So that’s what I would like to see us focus on.”

He’ll likely find himself at odds with others in his delegation.

The district he’ll represent is entirely in Lexington County. The 10 other House members who represent pieces of what’s normally a reliably red county include members of the uber-conservative Freedom Caucus. The only other Democrat is Rep. Jerry Govan of Orangeburg, who was first elected to the chamber in 1992.

The same wave that ousted Caskey in District 89 came close to toppling U.S. Rep. Joe Wilson, who lives in Springdale, from the 2nd Congressional District he’s represented since 2001.

Wilson’s winning margin of 0.95 percentage points was also finalized Wednesday following an automatic recount.

Greenville County Republican

Also holding on in a mandatory recount was Rep. David Vaughan of Simpsonville, who won by just 32 votes out of almost 18,300 ballots cast.

Two years ago, Vaughan defeated Democrat John MacCarthy by more than 20 percentage points. This year, he won re-election to District 27, located entirely in Greenville County, against the same Democrat by a fraction of a percentage point.

“I feel very thankful,” Vaughan told the SC Daily Gazette. “I knew that people were angry. I know that everybody was hurting from gas prices and grocery prices, and I knew that voter apathy was going to be a big issue. But I really and truly had no idea that it would quite turn out the way that it would.”

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Vaughan, first elected in 2022, said the tight race made it clear to him that the Legislature should focus on helping people through tough economic times.

He believes this means focusing on spending less and reducing taxes so people keep more of their money.

“It was a good wake up call for us that that people are really hurting, and I think the whole trajectory of the state House as a whole, not just me in my district, but as a whole, I think we’re going to really have to focus on how much money we spend, and how much money we can save and how much money we can send back to the citizens of South Carolina,” Vaughan said.

MacCarthy, a physics professor at Spartanburg Community College and former engineer, said his Christian faith propelled him to run again after his unsuccessful bid two years ago.

“My message was that we can do better than we’ve been doing in the state,” he said.

His first election allowed him to establish a base for his second run. He then built up a group of volunteers who helped reach other voters, MacCarthy said.

With the recounts completed on Tuesday, all races in South Carolina are officially certified.