After SC legislator resigned, he won anyway. Now a special election is set.
State Rep. Marvin Pendarvis, D-North Charleston, talks with attendees at the South Carolina Democratic Party's "First-in-the-Nation Celebration" dinner Saturday, Jan. 27, 2024, at the State Fairgrounds in Columbia, S.C. (File/Mary Ann Chastain/Special to the SC Daily Gazette)
Voters in March will replace former House Rep. Marvin Pendarvis in a special election, after the North Charleston Democrat won re-election on Tuesday despite resigning two months earlier.
Pendarvis was the only candidate for the 113 House District and won with over 97% of the vote. (More than 260 voters wrote in someone else's name on the ballot.)
The North Charleston Democrat said Wednesday he tried, unsuccessfully, to withdraw from the race shortly after he resigned on Sept. 16 and would not accept the seat he won by default.
The special election is set for March 25. That will leave the seat vacant for much of the 2025 legislative session, which starts Jan. 14.
"I'm sure the people will elect someone who's very capable," Pendarvis told the SC Daily Gazette on Wednesday morning.
He said he did not plan to get involved in a special election. At least one candidate had already jumped in the race by Thursday morning.
The announcement of the special election puts to rest weeks of confusion over what would happen to the seat.
Pendarvis told the Gazette that he sent a letter on Sept. 26 to the Charleston election office withdrawing as a candidate, repeating what he had told the Gazette prior to the election.
But Isaac Cramer, director of Charleston County elections, said on Wednesday morning that he never received such a letter. He did, however, receive it later that day, shortly after Pendarvis shared a copy of the letter with the Gazette.
Election officials then shared the letter with House Speaker Murrell Smith, who set the special election date as per state law.
The letter Pendarvis shared with the Gazette is written on House letterhead, dated Sept. 26, and addressed to the State Election Commission.
"Please allow this letter to serve as notice that I, Marvin R. Pendarvis, withdraw my candidacy for South Carolina House District 113, effective immediately," the two-sentence letter reads. "Thank you for your consideration of this request."
Pendarvis resigned from the seat he'd held since 2017 five months after a former client, Adrian Lewis, sued him, claimed Pendarvis settled his lawsuit without his knowledge, forged his signature for the $10,000 settlement, and then tried to buy him off to prevent the allegations from becoming public.
The day after Lewis filed his complaint in April, the State Law Enforcement Division confirmed an investigation into Pendarvis . In May, the state Supreme Court suspended his law license . The investigation continues.
