“I recommended, to Governor Henry McMaster, Lindsey Graham’s wonderful sister, Darline, to serve as interim Senator from the Great State of South Carolina. This would be a fabulous tribute to Lindsey, who loved her dearly!”
Because the purpose of appointing a new Senator is to send a tribute to the dead one, not to do what is in the best interests of the state he represented. Brilliant. Or that it is relevant how much the newly appointed Senator was loved by the deceased one. I suppose South Carolina citizens should be grateful that Lindsey won’t be replaced by his dog.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune told CNN’s Dana Bash, “I’ll let the governor make an announcement about that, but that certainly in my view makes a lot of sense. In many respects, it would be a way of extending Lindsey’s legacy here and certainly something that, if that’s what they decide to end up doing, I think there’d be a lot of support for it.”
This is the man that the GOP has leading it party, and he is evidently an idiot. Here, let me fix that statement for you, Senator: It makes no sense whatsoever. How does the middle name of a dead Senator’s sister make her a appointment a way of “extending his legacy”? Since when is the fact that there’s “a lot of support” for something prove that it’s a good idea?
Being the late Senator’s sister is virtually the only qualification for office Darline has, and that isn’t a qualification. Thanks to commenter Another Mike, I finally have more details (than I had yesterday, when this was posted) on Sis’s background:
“Before her appointment, Nordone worked with the South Carolina Vocational Rehabilitation Department and has served as Commissioner of the South Carolina Commission for the Blind since 2019. Nordone, a resident of Lexington, serves on the SC State Workforce Development Board and is the president-elect of the National Council of State Agencies for the Blind. She has a Bachelor of Arts in Sociology from the College of Charleston, a Master of Arts in Rehabilitation Counseling, and is a Certified Public Manager.”
Yesterday I wrote, “Maybe I should put it this way: Graham Platner is arguably more qualified to be a U.S. Senator than Darline Graham Nordone.” With the additional information, I withdraw the statement.
And being experienced working with the blind is certainly useful experience for a GOP U.S. Senator
Ethics Alarms 
I completely agree.
Ben Franklin was never more savagely correct with “a republic if you can keep it”….
Some would see no evidence of graduating from an institution of higher learning as a badge of honor…
Lindsey Graham had just won his primary last month…so he was up for re-election. I don’t know anything about South Carolina politics, but Mark Lynch scored a pretty strong second place in the primary with almost 30% of the vote (everyone else was in single digits).
It would make much more sense to me if the sister was allowed to serve out the six months remaining on his term, but have Lynch replace Graham on the November ballot. I could live with that. Is Ms. Nordone simply serving out his term or does she take his spot on the ballot as well?
Just a placeholder. It’s still absurd.
This might help. It was posted Monday at New Neo: [The source is a SC TV news outlet.]
“Before her appointment, Nordone worked with the South Carolina Vocational Rehabilitation Department and has served as Commissioner of the South Carolina Commission for the Blind since 2019.
“Nordone, a resident of Lexington, serves on the SC State Workforce Development Board and is the president-elect of the National Council of State Agencies for the Blind. She has a Bachelor of Arts in Sociology from the College of Charleston, a Master of Arts in Rehabilitation Counseling, and is a Certified Public Manager.”
The earlier comment questioning the actual benefit of “graduating from an institute of higher learning” is noted and agreed with.
I saw mention elsewhere that there will be a “snap primary” in August to choose the Republican candidate for November. It is unknown at this time if Ms Nordone will toss her hat into that ring. At this point she is a place holder, one that is believed to be a reliable DJT vote.
We shall see.
That does help. Thanks for finding it: I tried several search engines and two bots to get her educational credentials. I’m updating the post.
While you are absolutely correct that choosing a replacement based on familial love is absurd, Nrs. Nordone is not completely lacking education and experience. Her qualifications are at least as valid as Barack Obama’s were. Still, it would have been more savvy to appoint the Republican who has a chance to win the upcoming election.
I mean, someone has to get picked. Odds are its going to be someone the governor knows personally and can vouch for their politics. By pure mathematics, family members of sitting politicians are already going to be wildly over represented in the pool of people a governor knows more intimately. If the family member is a fairly known constant of alignment with the governor, then even more so.
At the end of the day a governor is going to choose someone who aligns politically with the governor and regardless of who that governor chooses, there will always be angles of attack to claim the selectee is some sort of inappropriate political appointee.
I think this is “ick”, not ethics. Amend the constitution to require automatic snap elections or something.