Day 3: Guest Lecturer Meg Kinnard from AP news and first day at the South Carolina Democratic Party

 

This morning our class was joined by AP News National 
Politics Reporter Meg Kinnard. AP News is the oldest and largest newspaper organization in the world. Meg Kinnard has lived in SC since 2005 covering the news,  has covered national politics since 2016 and has covered Nikki Haley since she was in the state legislature. 

After our guest lecture we went to the South Carolina Democratic Party headquarters to talk with Chair Christale Spain and Executive Director Jay Parmley. These leaders gave us a great overview of that the state party looks like, how they operate and what their interaction with the county parties are like. Jay explained how before 2008 the state party conducted primaries on their own with their own funding but after working with the state Republican party they were able to come together and change state law so that the state now funds, organizes and counts the primary. 

After this talk we spoke to Matt Greene, the SCDP Technology Director. He gave us a super helpful breakdown of the demographics of the state democratic party by age, race, county and turnout in elections in the past 20 years. The 2024 primary was actually the lowest turnout for the state party in the past 20 years. 

We finished off the day with more phone banking for the Lexington County Democratic Party and at dinner we wrote postcards asking people to attend their county convention.