♪ opening music ♪ ♪ ♪ >> Welcome to This Week in South Carolina.

I'm Gavin Jackson.

Last week, five women state senators Katrina Shealy, Margie Bright Matthews, Mia McLeod, Sandy Senn and Penry Gustafson were awarded the JFK Profiles in Courage Award for their bipartisan efforts to stop a near-total abortion ban in the state Senate.

We talked with Senator Shealy about the award and the work of these "sister senators".

But first, Congressman Jim Clyburn joins us to talk politics in Washington.

From a new speaker to the war in Israel.

Congressman Clyburn, thanks for joining me.

<Clyburn> Thank you very much for having me.

<Gavin> So, sir, before we go to Congress, let's go to the campaign trail really briefly.

Minnesota Democratic Congressman Dean Phillips announced he is running for president against President Joe Biden.

We're less than 100 days away from the first in the nation South Carolina primary, and Phillips has already registered for the New Hampshire primary, which Biden will not because because of the calendar and South Carolina has jumped in New Hampshire.

That's been approved by the DNC at Biden's request.

But you're a co-chair for Biden's re-election campaign.

So I think I know the answer to this question.

But does Phillips' bid matter at this point?

<Rep.

Clyburn> Well, I don't know why Phillips has gotten into the race in this manner.

The fact of the matter is, he's throwing tremendous disregard for the titular head of the party.

He is violating the Rules Committee because it has laid out what the sequence ought to be.

And he is showing a lot of disrespect for the voters of South Carolina.

We know what the history of these kinds of things is, and it's very clear.

Any time you have this kind of insurgency taking place with a sitting president, it has not faired well, and it's on both sides of the aisle.

It happened to Jimmy Carter when Teddy Kennedy challenged him, Carter lost in the general.

It happened to George H.W.

Bush when he was challenged in the primary.

He lost in the general election.

You come down through history, and that's been the case.

So I wish that Dean Phillips would take a look at what he's doing.

And it's not that he's representing any group of people.

He seems to be on a vanity trip, and that's all.

<Gavin> Mm hmm.

Congressman, let's jump to Congress where you are right now.

The Biden administration is pushing a $106 billion supplemental funding bill for national security issues, including the wars in Israel, Ukraine, as well as the southern border in Taiwan.

Should this funding bill be split up?

Will this bill pass without being split up?

<Rep.

Clyburn> This bill should not be split up.

And you see what's going on in the Senate in a very bipartisan way.

I don't think the country has seen in recent years the majority leader of the Senate, in this instance, the Democrat and the minority leader in the Senate, the Republican, Mitch McConnell and Schumer, are on the same page.

And we hear them speaking out very forcefully that this should be a package that moves forward, in unison.

And so for the House, the new speaker to split this up and condition, the aid for Israel is beyond anything this country has ever done.

It shows a lot, I think, of disrespect for NATO and our allies around the country.

And if we were to do this, we will be losing our standing on the world stage.

<Gavin> Mm hmm.

So sending a negative message to not only our allies, but also to these enemies as well.

<Rep.

Clyburn> Well, absolutely.

No question about it.

This will be viewed by a lot of people as being some kind of a bow to Putin and the Russians.

And that, to me, should be of concern to all Americans.

<Gavin> Congressman, we saw Republicans this week try and censure Michigan Democratic Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib over her comments and actions related to the growing Israel-Hamas conflict.

The resolution was defeated with 20 Republicans joining the Democrats.

What is your message to the more progressive left wing of your party amid this growing conflict?

<Rep.

Clyburn> Well, you know, everybody will represent their constituents.

Tlaib is elected by her constituents in Michigan.

And she is representing them the way she thinks they want to be represented.

That's not for me not to say how to conduct herself I do the same thing in the sixth Congressional District of South Carolina.

She doesn't agree with everything that I do, and I may not agree with everything that she does, but we really ought to reflect our constituents.

I try very hard to do that.

<Gavin> Congressman, House Republicans were in disarray for several weeks, and thus the House was, as well, without a speaker.

Then Louisiana Congressman Mike Johnson was elected.

Will there be any way for Democrats to work with Speaker Johnson, Any common ground that you see at this point?

<Rep.

Clyburn> Well, I would hope so.

I'm not too sure that we can.

You know, people talk about benevolence and demeanor.

He has a very pleasing demeanor.

But I'm concerned about his thought process.

I'm concerned about his beliefs.

I'm concerned about his practices.

I grew up in a pastance, so nobody had to tell me what the Bible teaches.

I know...books of the Bible very well, and I know what's in the book.

But I also know that in that book we are told that it's not their word, that should matter.

It's their deeds.

So what he says will not matter to me.

And he said, no, the book of Matthew well enough to know that it's his deeds that I'm going to be looking at.

And so far, I don't like what I've seen.

<Gavin> Time will tell.

Will the government shutdown come November 17?

Talk about deeds and moving forward and just the chaos we're seeing out of the Congress most recently.

<Rep.

Clyburn> I certainly hope not.

But there are forces within his conference that seem to want that to be the case.

I hope he doesn't.

<Gavin> Mm hmm.

Congressman, just switching over to the Senate really quick.

We're seeing a lot of heat being applied by fellow Republicans to Alabama Senator Tuberville there, who's holding up those promotions for military leaders.

What is your thoughts on that?

Do you think that America is not as secure as it should be when you have hundreds of folks in the military not moving and you have people doing multiple jobs?

A commandant of the U.S. Marine Corps had a heart attack, apparently because he was trying to do too much work because of this.

What message is that sending globally right now?

<Rep.

Clyburn> No.

Tuberville is one of the biggest disgraces I've ever seen come to the Congress.

He sits in the Senate with absolutely no understanding of what the Senate is all about.

I'm not sure he had a good understanding of what football was all about.

Football is about character building.

I think he was all about having the winning record.

I've talked to people who played for him and he was never about character building.

So this guy has just been a failure on all fronts and he's been a real failure in the Senate.

Now, I don't always agree with Lindsey Graham, but I do often agree with him.

And this is one of those times when I do very well agree with him.

<Gavin> You see him putting America at risk when it comes to national security?

<Rep.

Clyburn> Yes, absolutely.

But Tuberville wouldn't understand that.

He doesn't know what national security means.

<Gavin> Congressman, we have a few moments left and we thank you for your time on.

I'll ask you about the economy.

Americans remain concerned about the state of the economy, though it remains red hot, including a strong GDP numbers for the third quarter.

And unemployment is at a record low here in South Carolina.

It's also low nationwide, but inflation still persists and there's increased interest rates to help fight that.

Does this concern you?

Do you think we're on the right path to tackling persistent inflation right now?

<Rep.

Clyburn> Yes, I think we are on the right path.

But let's,...I don't think we get much help from a lot of people on the other side of the aisle when it comes to this.

If you ask people, are you in a better place today than you were five years ago, the answer is a resounding yes.

I get it from people.

Now.

If you say the president should be held responsible for what the Middle Eastern, -Middle East... oil oligarchs are doing, we remember just a few months ago when they decided that they were going to cut down on production of oil in order to run the price up.

The president can't do much about that, but when it comes to inflation on, say, medicine and those prices, the president stepped in and says, I can do something about the inflation here, and so I'm going to cap insulin, for instance, at $35 a month.

My late wife was paying $800 a month for her insulin.

And to cap at $35 a month that fights inflation.

And he's done that across the board in other things, as well.

And so this president is fighting inflation.

And just because people say, well, I'm paying a few more cents in gasoline taxes, well, how many most cents less?

Dollars less, that you're paying for your medicine.

Nobody wants to measure that.

They only want to measure that which is a negative.

So I say all the time we should accentuate the positive because it's good to eliminate these negatives.

But we don't want to do that because those won't give us headlines and therefore people won't talk about it.

<Gavin> Congressman, with about a minute left I want to ask you about poll numbers and Joe Biden's stance going into the election in 2024.

Are you concerned at this point?

We're almost a year away from Election Day about where Joe Biden stands in the polls, how he's, how he's doing at this point.

<Rep.

Clyburn> Yes, I'm concerned about that, but I was concerned when Bill Clinton was at the same point and polling the same way.

I was concerned about Barack Obama at this same point.

He was polling the same way, and both of them came out victorious 12 months later.

I think the same will happen here.

<Gavin> Gotcha.

Congressman Jim Clyburn, thank you for your time and thanks for joining us.

<Rep.

Clyburn> Thank you very much for having me.

<Gavin> Lexington Republican Senator Katrina Shealy, thanks for joining us this week.

<Sen.

Shealy> Thanks for having me.

It's always great to be here.

<Gavin> So, Senator, you and the four other female senators in the Senate, one Democrat, one Independent and two other Republicans along with you, make up "the sister senators" as they're known, and you all won the John F Kennedy Profile in Courage Award this year.

The organization awards these awards for public servants who have made courageous decisions of conscience without regard for the personal or professional consequences.

And in this case, it was because you all strove to protect abortion rights during the debate last fall.

And then this spring, amid criticism and promises of primary challengers, this year.

Next year, I should say.

I was there covering that debate.

You were there on the floor day in, day out.

It was a very intense debate.

Tell us, how did you view your actions at that time?

Would you say they were courageous or how did you view your fight?

>> I don't think I was any more courageous or did anything that I wouldn't have done anyway.

We showed more than anything else was how we could work together across party lines.

It wasn't so much about the issue as it was the fact that five women from different parties with different views.

We don't all feel the same way about that issue.

You know, some of us are more pro-choice than the others.

Some think we should have.

You know, I introduced a 12 week bill and some want You know, less time.

I mean, you know, more time.

You know, they want the first trimester, 15 weeks, some want more... We're all pro-life.

We all believe that there should be an opportunity for the baby born.

Nobody thinks that we should use abortion for birth control.

There's none of us believe that, and we've been pegged with being baby killers and all this stuff.

That's not true.

We don't deserve that.

But I don't think any of us did anything courageous.

We did what we thought was right.

But, you know, that's the fact that we received this award is a great honor.

And I don't think there's anybody in that chamber.

Had they been given the opportunity to receive the JFK Profiles in Courage Award would have turned it down for any reason.

<Gavin> Mm hmm.

Now, Senator, the crux of that debate was a near-total abortion ban bill that the House passed that you all helped block in the Senate, along with some other Republicans, some male Republicans.

What limit would you support?

Where do you see what would you have supported?

I mean, that 12 week we were at 20 weeks as a state, and then we got kicked down to six weeks with the current bill that was upheld by the state Supreme Court.

Where do you fall in all this?

<Sen.

Shealy> I stand at 12 weeks, and I offered that amendment and that amendment lost with a 21-23 vote.

And I think that if everybody in that chamber would really step up and be courageous and vote their real convictions or how they felt when they talked to their their wives and their daughters, I think we could have won that 12 week...amendment, but people are afraid of the next election or what's going to happen.

But I think you have to vote your convictions, what you truly believe.

And, you know, women's health care in South Carolina is so, we're just at rock bottom and you know, how we take care of babies after they're born is such a - we're in.

It's abysmal.

You know, that's the word I used in my speech.

We don't take care of children after they're born.

We worry more about how women have carried the baby in before they're born, and I think it's time for men and legislators to let women make health care decisions for themselves.

Now, do I think full term abortion should be allowed?

No one don't.

I don't think, you know, a third trimester.

You know, I don't think those are right, because then by then you should know, you know, what you wanted.

But we are being ridiculed for something that I don't even think people understand, and they're taking it out of context.

<Gavin> Yeah.

I mean, you've been censured by the Lexington County Republican Party.

Are you facing any Republican challengers?

I mean, you all are up for re-election next year in 2024.

What's it like between you and the other Republican females, Senator Sandy Senn and Senator Penry Gustafson?

<Sen.

Shealy> Senator Senn already has announced someone has announced to run against her and someone has announced to run against Senator Gustafson.

As of yet, no one has announced to run against me.

I'm sure there's someone back there waiting to come out and that's fine.

You know, everybody deserves the right to run.

They should just run for the right reasons.

If you look at my record and the things I've done over the last 11 years, I had passed more legislation to help children and families than anybody else's ever passed in that legislature.

And, you know, so they got to run against my record and my record stand on themselves.

<Gavin> Senator, do you think this is an issue that's a winning issue?

I mean, I know different areas have different beliefs and are more conservative in other parts of the state.

But, you know, when you hear folks like Congresswoman Nancy Mace from down in the Low country talking about how this debate needs to shift for Republicans to win, when you see referendums failing in other states, when you see other issues failing related to this, when you hear presidential candidate, Nikki Haley talking about a consensus approach versus a 15 week ban.

How do you see this debate playing out at the election booth next year?

<Sen.

Shealy> I think that once people get behind that curtain and vote what they really believe, I think that you'll see how it turns out.

I think if we would let the people vote on this issue, which, you know, the legislative makeup is not to the point where we're going to let people vote on it, because I think they're afraid of what the outcome would be.

It's just like Kansas.

You know, you let people vote how they want to vote and you're going to find out that it's not the way the legislature wanted.

That's why they won't let us do that.

When people actually pull that curtain or get over in their little booth or whatever to vote, they're going to find out that what we did was the right thing.

Now, everybody doesn't believe that.

And I'm not saying everybody believes it, because some people truly believe that, you know, a total ban on abortion is the right thing and that's fine.

You know, that's your belief.

But I believe some people and some people in the legislature are not voting their conviction.

They're voting for an election.

<Gavin> You know, we heard that from former Justice Kaye Hearn, who was on this show in May talking about how she even heard from some lawmakers wives, talking about how they were not fans of their husbands votes.

So a lot going on there both behind the scenes and on the House and Senate floors.

But should the Senate become more conservative?

Do you think that there will be another attempt to push through a near-total abortion ban?

Because that was something that you all helped block?

And, you know, if you do see some people replaced, is that going to happen?

<Sen.

Shealy> I think that we will always there will always going to be that group of people.

That want a total abortion ban.

I think that as long as we have the right people there, that a total abortion ban is wrong.

I mean, that's just wrong.

Do I think that it'll pass?

They'll have to get rid of a lot of people to pass it, because I think the men that stood with us would still stand with us against a total abortion ban.

We're going to have more women.

I hope that more women win seats.

We may lose some women, but I hope we have women to take the place of other, you know, other male senators.

So we just have to work to get the right people in there.

<Gavin> Yeah, we expect to see another Democrat, a Democratic woman, I should say, coming into the Senate chamber from District 19.

That's, that was the seat held by the late Senator John Scott.

Tamika Isaac Devine is the Democratic nominee for that, and she has a special election in early January but is expected to win because that is a Democratic district.

But do you think that's maybe a solution here when you see, you know, the representation of women in the chamber?

I think with her would be 13% of that chamber would be women.

Do you think there needs to be more diversity to understand this issue?

And that's maybe one of the reasons why it's still coming up over and over again.

>> I think there's a lot of legislation that needs to be passed because the health care for women and children is, you know, it's in a state of disrepair right now in South Carolina.

We have 46 counties in South Carolina and 15 of those counties don't have an OB-Gyn at all.

We expect women to have more babies now.

And, you know, because we don't want abortions, but we don't have anybody to take care of these.

We don't have the help.

We don't have childcare for all these children when the women have them or, ...men need child care, too.

This is not just a women's issue.

You know, when they go to work, we need to take care of our children, but we need good childcare.

So we need those child care tax credits.

We need to make sure there's good childcare.

It's safe and, you know, make sure that everybody is checked out.

So there's so many things we need to do.

I mean, I could go on.

We have a list of upcoming legislation.

We've been having meetings all year, you know, through the summer to let the public come in and tell us what we need.

And we take those to heart and we go in and try and correct the legislation that we need to help the parents and, you know, the mothers and their children across the state.

So we're ready to go back to work and get these things done and not keep going back to the same thing over and over again.

Let's do something about to correct what we've already done and help those people that we put in the situations we've got them in.

<Gavin> And Senator, are you hearing positive feedback from leadership?

I know you're a committee chairwoman, but what about the leadership in the Senate?

Are they willing to push some of these bills through?

<Sen.

Shealy> Well, I hope so.

We've had that...committee that's been meeting on the Healthy Meals all summer or all of session.

And hopefully they will let that bill come up where we can feed our children at school.

To me, that's an important issue because children learn better.

Teachers can teach when children are not hungry, and sometimes that's the only meal they get all day is what they get at school.

So to pass that bill and it's not the astronomical number they came up with last year of like 192 million.

That was absurd.

That was a number that was thrown out there to keep that bill from passing.

So the real number is probably in the $50 million range.

It might be less than that.

But we spend that kind of money on things that are a lot less important than our children.

So we need to take care of our children in schools and pass that bill.

So I'm hoping that will come up whether it's my bill, the one I put up last year, or it's the House bill.

I don't care how it gets there.

We just need to do it.

<Gavin> Got you.

That's Lexington Republican Senator Katrina Shealy.

Thank you for joining us.

And again, congratulations on your award.

<Sen.

Shealy> Thank you so much, and thank you for having me here today.

>> To stay up to date throughout the week, check out the South Carolina Lede.

It's a podcast I host on Tuesdays and Saturdays that you can find on South Carolina Public radio.org or wherever you find podcasts.

For South Carolina ETV.

I'm Gavin Jackson.

Be well, South Carolina.

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