State Supreme Court Justice Don Beatty said Wednesday that third-party groups using him as the “poster boy” to attack candidates across South Carolina are the “new face of the Klan.”

Beatty accused organizations such as the S.C. Club for Growth, South Carolinians for Responsible Government and Conservatives in Action of distorting his record as a legislator in the 1990s to scare voters away from candidates they oppose. He said they’ve never cited any of the decisions he’s handed down in more than 12 years on the bench that would support their claims that he’s a liberal judge.

“It makes me wonder what their real reason is for attacking me,” Beatty said. “It’s because I’m an easy target, and they can use code words and my black face to appeal to voters that they might be able to enrage against legislators that supported me…These people give conservatives a bad name. I’ve heard them referred to on more than one occasion as the new face of the (Ku Klux) Klan. I’m almost about to believe that.”

Reaction from representatives of the groups ranged from outrage to surprise.

SCRG spokesman Neil Mellen said Beatty’s comment was “insulting” and “incredibly offensive.” He said SCRG has looked at Beatty’s decisions, but the “most telling indicators” of his judicial approach could be found in his approach to legislation.

Club for Growth spokesman Matt Moore said he was “appalled that someone of Justice Beatty’s stature would evoke such strong language.” He pointed out that the group endorsed Tim Scott, an African-American running for the District 117 House seat.

“Club for Growth has been at the forefront of government restructuring issues,” Moore said. “Certainly movement in the right direction would allow more African-Americans, and any other race, to have more influence in state government.”

Conservatives in Action spokesman Taft Matney said he’d been called a lot of things, but a Klansman was never one of them.

“I’m ashamed Justice Beatty is representing our state on that court after making those assertions,” Matney said. “It’s absurd, it’s abhorrent and it’s a shame.”

Matney said Beatty was neglecting his duty to uphold the rights of others to express their opinions.

“For him to take issue with South Carolinians that disagree with him and attack their rights to share their opinions is abhorrent,” he said.

Beatty said that works both ways, and that he’s allowed to express his opinions as well. He said he wasn’t attacking anyone’s rights, but he was no longer going to sit silently while his reputation was maligned.

“I’ve been quiet on this issue for quite some time,” Beatty said. “Throughout the campaign (for the Supreme Court) I allowed it to go on. But since then it’s come up time and time again, and they’re using the same arguments they used before, knowing they aren’t true.”

Beatty said a mail piece that Conservatives in Action sent out opposing Rep. Bob Walker, R-Landrum, was Exhibit A.

The flier asks voters to call Walker and “tell him to stop supporting liberals for South Carolina state judgeships.” The flier lists 12 House bills, some dating back to 1992, as evidence that Beatty “voted with the pro-abortion radicals, voted against gun owners and pushed for higher taxes and more wasteful spending” - the same charges Conservatives in Action leveled a year ago in opposing Beatty’s election to the Supreme Court.

Beatty, armed with copies of the bills, gave a point-by-point rebuttal of those claims.

For example, the Conservatives in Action piece claims that bill 4720, filed in 1992, demonstrates Beatty’s willingness to raise taxes. The bill, however, relates to the Berkeley County Board of Education, “so as to provide that vacancies must be filled for the unexpired portion of the term by special election.”

Matney said he didn’t have the bill numbers in front of him so he couldn’t address Beatty’s assertions, but questioned whether some numbers could have been transposed on the flier.

Walker said the groups have attacked Beatty based on a variety of obscure amendments in some of those bills. But he, too, questioned whether race was the issue based on conversations with constituents.

Walker said a several voters told him that in a push-poll conducted in April, they were asked how they would rate him if they knew he had voted for a black judge. He said he didn’t know who paid for the calls, and that the callers did not identify themselves.

“I don’t know who put it out there,” Walker said. “But they couldn’t attack him on his record so they had to attack him on race.”

Rep. Bill Cotty, R-Columbia, said he understands why Beatty would feel the way he does. Cotty was targeted when he ran for re-election in 2006. He is now head of the group South Carolinians for Truth - which bills itself as a “watchdog group working to set the record straight when organizations misrepresent the truth.”

“They represent the worst in politics,” Cotty said. “If we don’t take steps to get rid of these groups … then we deserve the reputation that we’re getting for malicious, scandalous and low-level politics.”

Staff writer Jason Spencer contributed to this report.

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I can’t believe it’s been two years since my sisters and I first wrote asking you to vote for our Dad, Keith Kelly. At that time I attended the University of South Carolina and worked part-time at the State House for Representative Scott Talley. When Dad was elected, he joined me at the State House and it was awesome watching him at work. I was very proud of how hard he worked for Spartanburg County and I know you are too.

Today I’m writing to give you 5 more reasons you should vote for my dad:

1. Dad is a conservative. He still gets mad when we leave the lights on or just stand there with the refrigerator door open. He took that same attitude to the State House and I watched him vote to cut grocery and income taxes last year by $260 Million. This year he pushed spending caps so that the big-spending politicians stop wasting our tax dollars on their pet projects.

2. Dad is honest. While working at the State House, I saw many politicians concentrate on their own political agendas instead of their constituents. That’s not Dad. Even when it’s not the popular thing to do among his colleagues and when the special interests get mad, he always votes for Spartanburg County.

3. Dad has a deep love for Spartanburg’s schools. Over the last few weeks you have been receiving a lot of attack mail about Dad. That group SCRG is attacking Dad because he keeps voting against their programs that will harm schools like Woodruff, Dorman, and Byrnes High Schools. Please don’t believe the lies about Dad. He is a good man and I’m very proud of the way he

4. Dad is hardworking. I am always amazed by his ability to balance his legislative, work, and family lives. I don’t know how he does it, but he does it well. He is an amazing father. He never misses one of Hannah’s soccer games and he’s always there for Lillie and me when we need him. As a legislator, he always puts constituent services first. Spartanburg families know they can count on Dad.

5. Dad is a conservative…did I mention that yet? I’m getting married next month and even though he has to pay for a big wedding, Dad voted against a legislative pay increase this year. That’s just how Dad is. He’s there to serve you, not to make money or climb the political ladder.

Keith Kelly is an amazing Dad and a wonderful State Representative. Please get out and vote in the Republican primary next Tuesday.

Sincerely,

Whitney Kelly

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Two Spartanburg County high schools have been recognized on the 2008 Newsweek magazine / Washington Post list of top U.S. high schools. Both Spartanburg High School and Woodruff High School made the Challenge Index, which aims to measure how students perform given the rigor of the courses.

The formula counts the total number of AP tests taken at a school divided by the number of graduating seniors. Schools with a ratio of 1.000 or higher are placed on the list. This year that includes 1,358 schools, or about 5 percent of public high schools nationwide.

The article in the May 26 issue of Newsweek reads, “We are all seeking the same thing, which is schools that better serve our children and our nation by encouraging students to tackle tough subjects under the guidance of gifted teachers.”

This year is the fifth time since 2003 both WHS (ranked 763) and SHS (ranked 921) have been included on the Challenge Index.

“We pride ourselves on providing for all students,” said SHS principal Rodney Graves. “Anything we offer here we try to do it first class and try to be a leader in the state and a leader in the nation.”

The District 7 school offers 22 different AP courses to its students. Graves said the Index proves the commitment of the school, district and community to offer only the best to SHS students.

“We have a little bit of everything, and our school district has been very committed to having offerings. If students want to take it, we try to offer it,” he said.

Woodruff High School principal Karen Neal said she is thrilled the school is once again included among the nation’s top high schools. She said the ranking is an affirmation of the school’s offering of AP courses to students.

“We can see the results of our high expectations as our students are able to move on to college and are successful,” Neal said. “I think the AP program takes a large part of the credit there.”

Nineteen South Carolina public high schools made the list, up four since last year.

The list does not include schools with an average SAT score of more than 1300 or an ACT score of 29 or higher as it is only intended to recognize schools that challenge average students.

However, rankings of non-eligible schools and a complete list of schools on the Challenge Index can be found on Newsweek’s Web site at newsweek.com.

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This year, I was extremely proud to see my daughter, Hannah, win this year’s award for Woodruff High School. I also want to congratulate Patrick Tate Roebuck for winning the Governor’s Citizenship Award for Dorman High School.

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Hundreds of fliers are appearing in Spartanburg mailboxes supporting a specific slate of candidates, billing them as tax-cutting conservatives. But some say that the spending issues highlighted on those fliers are a veil to cover the group’s real agenda, school choice.

South Carolinians for Responsible Government has sent mailings in support of Republican candidates Roger Nutt, an engineer facing incumbent Rep. Keith Kelly, and Joey Millwood, a journalist facing incumbent Rep. Bob Walker in June. The group has also sent out a flier supporting Ken Roach, who is running against fellow Republican and retired gas company executive Mike Forrester to challenge Democrat Ronnie Hart in November.

The candidates supported by South Carolinians for Responsible Government say that group issued its support without their knowledge, but they welcome it. The Responsible Government group’s leaders say their organization is being pigeonholed as a single-issue advocate. S.C. law does not require so-called political awareness groups to disclose their donors, so it is unclear who is funding these mailings.

The content of the mail pieces focuses on the growth in state spending in recent years. The mailings contend that the current $7.2 billion budget represents about a 41 percent increase over the $5.1 billion budget from the 2003-04 spending cycle.

The first flier for Nutt and Millwood features a cartoon pig and a “Columbia Politician Pork Sampler” listing various programs funded by state grants. The second one features a masked man on the front, a chubby, cigar-smoking man in a suit and tie on the inside and proclaims, “We used to call them bank robbers. Now we call them Columbia’s Career Politicians.”

“We’ve got to get a handle on our spending. So, we need to look at pork and wasteful spending and cut out as much of that as we can. I’m for a cap on spending,” Nutt said.

“I think that’s great that there’s groups out there that want to support people. It’s hard to say they’re not campaign pieces, but the two I’m looking at, they’re educating the constituents about what’s going on now and about certain candidates.”

Nutt and Millwood said the first time they saw the fliers was after they were mailed out.

Both men have retained the services of consultant Chad Connelly, a board member of South Carolinians for Responsible Government.

Walker and Kelly say their opponents are twisting the numbers, and that looking back to 1994 - the year Republicans took over the state House - the budget has increased an average of 4 percent each year.

“My church budget grows that much,” Kelly said. “I can keep costs down. I can cut it 50 percent. Let him (Nutt) look at it and tell me how many teachers he wants me to fire.”

He added that he didn’t know how he could be considered a “career politician” when he’s only 18 months into his first term.

Nutt said there were plenty of other avenues the state could take to cut costs before firing teachers.

“If Keith really wants to get involved, tell him to call for a recorded vote next time, so we’ll know for a fact he didn’t vote himself a pay raise,” Nutt said.

Walker said 4 percent is an increase tied to population growth and inflation, the standard Republicans have set for spending. He cited the Legislature cutting grocery taxes, property taxes and income taxes in the last several years.

“To say that I’m against cutting taxes, or imply that, that’s not true,” Walker said.

Nutt and Millwood said that focusing on recent years is more indicative of spending trends in South Carolina.

“In recent years, it’s grown more than 40 percent. That’s an odd change. That’s not what conservatism is about. That’s not what being a Republican is about,” Millwood said.

“Since 1994 … you can say a lot of things. My household output has not grown over 40 percent in the last few years. And I don’t think it has for a lot of South Carolina households. So, the government shouldn’t have grown that much. We’re not talking about 1994.”

Dollars and diplomas

Political consultant Wesley Donahue called the fliers a diversion from South Carolinians for Responsible Government’s true agenda - putting legislators in Columbia who support school choice.

Donahue’s client list includes Kelly, Forrester, and state Rep. Scott Talley, who is seeking a Senate seat against Lee Bright and L.B. Watson.

“Look at those mail pieces, and you will know which legislators stand with South Carolina public schools,” Donahue said. “Bob Walker, Keith Kelly, Mike Forrester - these are people that stand with Spartanburg County public schools. It’s these Ken Roaches and Roger Nutts of the world that have sold their soul to the voucher crowd.”

“These guys are being back-funded, and recruited by these out-of-state millionaires who want to experiment on our public schools,” Donahue said. “They should have to disclose. Everybody else does. That’s what’s so dirty about this whole thing.”

On school choice, Roach has said that modernizing classrooms, recruiting higher-quality teachers - also possibly increasing teacher salaries - and getting more parents involved in education could make the issue moot. At a forum this week, Roach emphatically denied that his vote was for sale.

Millwood has said that he would not support vouchers but would consider tax credits for parents who opt to send their children to a nonpublic school.

Nutt takes a similar stance, adding that a tax credit wouldn’t account for the total dollar amount the state gives each school per pupil, and that in the long run, public schools would make money off of some parents having a choice. In other words, the parents would receive a tax credit, and the school would receive the balance of the money it would have gotten for that student, even though that student would be enrolled somewhere else.

“School choice itself is a tenet of the Republican Party. So, the concept that parents are given a choice as to how their children are educated is something I would stand behind. The voucher idea, I’m not for. But I would entertain looking at the tax credits,” Nutt said.

“It shows the government is not working against families, but that it’s trying to help. If nothing else, it’s symbolic.”

Campaigning vs. educating

South Carolinians for Responsible Government has been tied to New York millionaire Howard Rich, who has supported a number of Republican candidates in this state through a variety of organizations and like-minded associates.

In 2006, South Carolinians for Responsible Government sued the State Ethics Commission after its director said it was trying to influence an election and had to disclose financial information. The state Attorney General’s Office refused to provide the ethics commission with attorneys, and the case was eventually dismissed.

A bill this year that would have required political awareness organizations to disclose their financial information went nowhere.

Neil Mellen, spokesman for South Carolinians for Responsible Government, called forcing a private, membership-supported group to disclose its financial information “ridiculous.”

“We had been sort of pegged as a school-choice group,” he said. “While we see expanding educational opportunities and access as part of that limited, responsible government movement, certainly there are fiscal, spending and revenue, transparency, accountability, and streamlining of government issues. We see school choice as kind of fitting into that. In fact, we’re interested in the larger cause of responsible government.”

Mellen said the fliers were meant to “educate voters about who’s running, and where they stand on issues,” and were not campaign literature.

“That’s semantics,” Kelly said. “This right here is campaign literature.”

Kelly was supported by South Carolinians for Responsible Government two years ago.

Walker, in a separate interview, added, “I don’t consider them education pieces. I consider them negative campaigning. I’m running my campaign on what Bob Walker’s done. If they’re sending out mail pieces to my people, they need to send out what Bob Walker’s done. I mean, I’m one of 124 (members of the state House of Representatives).”

South Carolinians for Responsible Government is just one of many groups that have taken an interest in local races.

The Spartanburg Home Builders Association, for instance, has begun issuing endorsements, and the Spartanburg Board of Realtors has, through its associated statewide political action committee, begun contributing to candidates, too.

The South Carolina AARP also has sent postcards out of Columbia thanking Talley for his work on identity theft legislation. It includes a disclaimer that the card does not constitute a political endorsement.

“What’s happening is that South Carolinians for Responsible Government and the S.C. Club for Growth seem to be the two that are pouring money in our local campaigns. If they do fliers, it’s basically the same as giving money,” Spartanburg County Republican Party Chairman Rick Beltram said.

“I welcome everybody’s involvement. And I will not throw stones at any of them as long as none of them throw stones at me” Beltram said.

“I think all of them are accurate to a point, but if you fact check them down to the minutiae, you’ll find disparities in all that stuff. I don’t think there’s a flier that’s gone out by any candidate or group that poses something as a fact that, in reality, is open to debate.”

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Like the sauce, the various candidates to take the stage Monday night at Ron’s Hog Pen BBQ were mostly different shades of red - and some of them had a little kick.

Sixteen state and local Republican candidates sat shoulder to shoulder on a tiny stage for nearly three hours in exchange for, at the most, about five minutes of scattered speaking time in a wide-ranging debate sponsored by the local GOP. Another arrived late, and opted to stand on the stage steps rather than shoehorn himself into the group.

For some of the topics, many of the answers were predictable - no one opposed putting a cap on state spending, for instance, and no one outright opposed requiring private employers to use a federal database to verify that their employees are legal residents of the United States - though some talked around it.

Because of so many similar positions, the night was best served by being able to judge which candidates could think on their feet, who seemed the most passionate about different issues, who was the most informed about the issues affecting this state, and who could best handle themselves in front of a crowd.

That’s not to say there were no differences - just that, in some cases, those differences were just as much about poise as they were about positions.

One of the most surprising answers of the night came from county coroner candidate Rick Cherry, who - tired of passing on questions not relevant to that office - jumped in on a question about job growth in Spartanburg County and said tongue-in-cheek that such growth would bring more people, which would mean more deaths, and therefore, underscored the need for a qualified person in that office.

His opponent, Rusty Clevenger, asked over the laughter, “Ladies and gentlemen, what can you say to that?”

Other lines from the night that got a rise from the near-400 people in the crowd:

– House candidate Steve Parker said he would sponsor a bill that requires lawmakers to put their name on every vote they take.

– County Council incumbent Rock Adams often quipped about the 1-minute time limit, which cut him off several times as he was just getting into a list of statistics he brought. (He also brought a chart.)

– House candidate Christina Jeffrey went beyond the current immigration question, saying E-Verify issue would be solved this year, and that next year, she would sponsor a resolution every day to call on the federal government to enforce the laws on the books.

– House incumbent Bob Walker played up a stipulation he added to the immigration reform bill in Columbia that would prevent children here illegally from getting state scholarships.

– Walker’s challenger, Joey Millwood, got a burst of cheers when, after agreeing with Walker that the state government needs to be less involved in higher education, he suggested that part of the problem with rising tuition costs was overpaid “liberal professors.”

– Rep. Scott Talley, who is seeking an open Senate seat, closed the night with a laugh by thanking his opponents for all of the courtesies they extended to him. (Neither of them showed up.)

For incumbents, the night was a chance to highlight their records. For challengers, it was a chance to try to prove their opponents disingenuous or, a favorite of the night, in the pocket of special interest groups.

As the night wore on, House candidate Mike Forrester alluded to his opponent, Ken Roach, being funded by out-of-state special interest groups. Roach said emphatically that his vote was not for sale, and he claimed Forrester was propped up to run for office by the local chamber of commerce.

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Spartanburg Herald Journal
By Jason Spencer
5/11/08

A boatload of Republican state and local candidates will sit down to eat pork Monday night before they spend two hours talking about cutting it, among other things.

Twenty-one candidates have been invited to a forum hosted by the Spartanburg County Republican Party. The debate begins at 7 p.m. at Ron’s Family Restaurant. The event will feature questions by Herald-Journal Editorial Page Editor Mike Smith, Hometown News reporter Leon Russ and WORD radio personality Bob McLain.

The panel also can opt to ask questions submitted beforehand by the audience.

“What I’m trying to accomplish is to let the general public come and see all the candidates for all the local contested primary races at one time,” county GOP Chairman Rick Beltram said.

“It helps when you can compare a House race in one area with a House race in a nearby area. I think everybody realizes that nobody can go down to Columbia and say, ‘I’m going to hold down spending.’ You can’t do it by yourself. It has to be a group of people … forming a working majority to get things passed.”

The format is simple. A question is posed, and each candidate has a chance to respond. If they choose to respond, they’ll have one minute. A three-person panel of judges will determine whether someone is allowed a 30-second rebuttal after a response.

For instance, if incumbent Rep. Keith Kelly doesn’t answer a question, there would be less pressure on his challenger, Roger Nutt, to answer that question — and vice versa. But if one candidate from any given race answers, it’s a safe bet the others competing for that seat will interject, too.

About 100 tickets are left (out of an initial 300) for a pre-debate dinner that begins at 5:30 p.m. A short county GOP executive committee meeting will take place between dinner and the 7 p.m. debate.

The two candidates in the 4th Congressional District and the two for U.S. Senate have been invited to speak for up to five minutes each before the debate starts.

Campaigns of incumbent Rep. Bob Inglis and his challenger, Charles Jeter, both confirmed they will be there. Incumbent Sen. Lindsey Graham will not be able to attend because of business in Washington, his campaign said, but he is sending state House Speaker Pro Tem Doug Smith to speak in his place. The campaign of Buddy Witherspoon, who is challenging Graham, has confirmed he will be there.

Each candidate has been given a short questionnaire on about a dozen issues, ranging from school consolidation to impact fees to an added tax on cigarettes.

The results from those questionnaires will be compiled and handed out to the audience before the debate begins, Beltram said.

The barbecue restaurant is just north of I-85 on Highway 9.

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