By admin 
Lt. Gov. Pamela Evette stood in front of three South Carolina flags and three American flags at the 2026 governor’s awards for excellence in science ceremony. She handed the recipients their awards as emcees read descriptions of the work.
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Three of the four recipients were women, an aspect the first female Republican lieutenant governor in South Carolina pointed out to the crowd in the first floor lobby.
“It’s nice to see three ladies,” Evette said.
It was Evette’s first public speaking engagement in South Carolina since losing in the runoff for the Republican nominee for governor to Attorney General Alan Wilson.
Shortly after posing for pictures at the awards, Evette walked back to her office where photos of her with President Donald Trump, former Vice President Mike Pence, Vice President JD Vance and Eric Trump hang on the wall. There’s also a photo of her being sworn in and an autographed Clemson football helmet.
Talking in her office, she’s relaxed and refreshed, no longer dealing with the day-to-day demands of a campaign for statewide office. Her first rest was in the days after losing the runoff for the Republican nomination for governor, Evette took a trip with her husband, David, to Las Vegas.
They traveled with friends, went shopping and saw The Wizard of Oz at The Sphere.
“So (I) got away and got with friends and decompressed and did some retail therapy, which was good for me,” Evette said in her first interview after the runoff about the campaign and life after her term as lieutenant governor finishes in January.
After finishing in first place in the June 9 primary with a 13,000-vote margin, then losing the runoff by 118,000 votes, Evette still maintains she would not have done anything differently in the race.
“I don’t play that could have, would have, should have game because when you change one thing, you change everything,” Evette said.
Her campaign’s central message was her loyalty to Trump, longer than any other hopeful in the GOP field.
“You are what you are, and what I find really hard about politics is what people pretend to be, as opposed to who they are,” Evette said. “And if there’s one thing I can feel proud of, and I’m very proud that my children witnessed that, is that who I was in this office, who I was sitting on the porch at my home, to who I was wherever I was, was the same person. I was never going to make a promise that I didn’t believe in.”
She has been a Trump supporter since the 2016 campaign.
“Why would I back off now? Isn’t that disingenuous? Like I stood with the president upstairs when nobody else did,” Evette said referring to his January 2023 campaign event at the South Carolina State House.
Evette was endorsed by Trump before the primary, an endorsement that helped secure the first place finish and a spot in the two-week runoff. But as polling showed support consolidating around Attorney General Alan Wilson, the president issued a dual endorsement the Friday before the runoff election.
“The president can do what the president does, and I learned a long time ago that I base everything on what I can control and what I can do,” Evette said when asked what her reaction was to Trump’s double endorsement.
Two-and-a-half weeks after the runoff, a political earthquake hit South Carolina with the death of U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham. While the state mourned, maneuvering began for who would run in a special Republican primary to replace Graham on the November ballot.
Evette said she wasn’t interested in running for the U.S. Senate, even though she had some supporters pushing her to get into the race.
“I’m much more of a problem solver. I’m not much of an arguer. Like I think that’s the difference between being an entrepreneur and a CEO, you’re used to just fixing, like identifying the problem and fixing the problem. That arguing, that’s not a me thing,” Evette said.
Evette spoke with Gov. Henry McMaster the day after Graham died and before Darline Graham was appointed to finish the term.
The discussions were “more like what’s going to happen,” Evette said.
She’s still paying attention, however, to what’s being said in the Senate election and may publicly back a candidate in the special primary.
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The interview with Evette came the day after the second GOP debate for the U.S. Senate. In response to an attack by Mark Lynch over Silfab, U.S. Rep. Ralph Norman said the governor and lieutenant governor supported the Silfab development, which in March had a chemical spill at its York County facility.
The brief comment prompted a post on X from an angry Evette.
“Let me be clear, Rep. Norman and I have never discussed my views or serious concerns regarding Silfab. I would respectfully ask that he refrain from speaking on my behalf during tonight’s debate and in the future,” Evette posted.
Evette said she had a high-level understanding of Silfab and she read through research put together by people concerned about the business. She also worked to connect a group concerned with Silfab with the Environmental Protection Agency.
“I don’t lie. I’ve never lied, and I’m always who I am,” Evette said. “I’ve never had a conversation with Ralph Norman about Silfab.”
Evette on the state of the GOP
Evette during her campaign did not have a good relationship with the state Republican Party.
“I don’t think the party should be as political as it is? Like the party shouldn’t be picking winners and losers and I don’t feel like that’s necessarily the case,” Evette said.
Evette said she met a lot of great people at party events and gravitated towards those who weren’t participating in order to run for a party office. Instead, she preferred interacting with those who paid their dues and came to listen.
“It is kind of the worker bees.”
Evette has concerns about the divisions within the party, that includes the hard-line conservative state Freedom Caucus, the mainstream Republicans and the My SC GOP faction.
“I’m worried that we’re fracturing, and we need somebody that kind of brings everybody together because if we keep dividing up, a house divided, will topple on itself,” Evette said.
What about after her term as lieutenant governor ends?
Evette, who owned Quality Business Solutions before she was in office, says she plans to go into a new business venture after her term ends, but wouldn’t disclose additional details.
She also plans to write a book about her time in South Carolina politics where most of the elected officials in the State House and in statewide office are men.
“Everybody wants to know because, literally, I had opponents trying to paint me as an insider. I’m the biggest outsider under this roof. And like, what does it look like? Not just the fact that being a woman in a really male-dominated profession — if you call this a profession … coming in and then witnessing what happens,” Evette said.
She plans to stay involved in politics, including supporting others seeking office.
“What I will do is be involved in any way I can, whether it’s sitting on corporate boards to make sure that proper things get done,” Evette said.
“I will really get active in quality candidates that I think will take an honest approach to government, really talk about the good and bad, really focus on good growth,” Evette said.
Evette said, however, she won’t rule out a future run.
“I never say never because I never thought I would have been lieutenant governor, right? I never thought I would run for governor,” Evette said. “I just think God has a weird way of opening different doors. I’ve always believed that.”
“If an opportunity popped up where I could do something great, then I would do it because I think we all serve in different ways,” Evette added.
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