By admin 
As South Carolina voters prepare to cast ballots in a special Republican primary election next month, a former Myrtle Beach mayor is joining the race for the late Sen. Lindsey Graham’s seat.
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Former Myrtle Beach Mayor Mark McBride, who once ran in the Republican primary for South Carolina’s 2004 Senate election, is running again 23 years later to represent the Palmetto State. In an announcement shared to Facebook, McBride wrote that he filed to join the race on Tuesday.
“Yesterday, I filed with [the] South Carolina Election Commission, in the South Carolina Republican Special US Senate Primary election to fill the open seat created by Senator Graham’s passing,” McBride said.
Who is Mark McBride?
McBride is no stranger to politics. He served a four-year term on Myrtle Beach City Council before serving as mayor from 1998 to 2005. In his Senate run during his mayoral term, McBride came in fifth in the Republican primary with about 2% of the vote.
Years later, McBride entered the 2020 special Republican primary for South Carolina House of Representatives District 107. With about 30% of votes, McBride lost to his opponent, Case Brittain.
McBride ran again soon after in the Republican primary for the 2022 U.S. House South Carolina District 7 seat. He took sixth place in that primary with roughly 2% of the vote. Republican Rep. Russell Fry won both the primary and the general election, taking office in 2023.
Fry and McBride will face off once again in the special Republican primary election for the Senate, as the congressman also entered the race this week.
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Most recently, McBride vied for a second term as mayor of Myrtle Beach last year. In the nonpartisan election, he garnered about 16% of votes and came in third place.
What is Mark McBride’s platform?
A campaign material-style graphic shared online shows McBride’s name with the slogan “Put. America. First.”
McBride doesn’t appear to have created a campaign website with a published platform or list of priorities, but he defended past online statements advocating for an end to the war with Iran in a Wednesday morning post.
“A solid underlying platform to this campaign is my disagreement with [the] President taking us to war with Iran over a year ago. This War of Choice has now become the War of Hormuz,” McBride wrote. “Disengage. End the War. Bring the troops home.”
“A vote on Tuesday, August 11th for Mark McBride is NOT a vote to continue to have our troops as sitting ducks in uninhabitable, destroyed former U.S. Bases in the Middle East,” he continued. “A vote for Mark McBride is for a new direction for the Republican Party.”
McBride did not respond to The Sun News’s requests for comment before publication.
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