# Annie Andrews Pediatrician and **Democratic nominee for the United States Senate from South Carolina** in the 3 November 2026 general election, running against appointed incumbent **[[Darline Graham]]**. She won the Democratic primary on **9 June 2026 with 61.5%** (226,075 votes) over Brandon Brown (30.2%) and Kyle Freeman (8.3%). Born Anne Elizabeth Lintzenich in 1981 in Paducah, Kentucky, she holds a bachelor's degree from the University of Dayton, a master's in clinical research from the Medical University of South Carolina, and an M.D. from the University of Cincinnati. She moved to the South Carolina Lowcountry in 2009 and spent roughly fourteen years as a pediatric hospitalist at MUSC Children's Hospital, resigning in June 2023; as of mid-2025 she worked part-time at Children's National Hospital in Washington, D.C., while living in Charleston. ## Why she is in this vault She is the **counterparty in the clearest endorsement-power experiment of the cycle.** The vault tracks [[SC-Sen-2026]] because an appointed newcomer with no electoral record converted a [[Donald Trump]] endorsement into a Senate nomination over a sitting congressman. The measurement only closes in November, and Andrews is the other half of it: a conventional, credentialed, well-funded challenger in a state that has not elected a Democrat to the Senate since 1998. The second reason is that she **ran before and lost by fourteen points**, which gives the 2026 result a baseline. In 2022 she was the Democratic nominee in South Carolina's 1st congressional district and lost to Republican [[Nancy Mace]] 56.5% to 42.5% on 8 November 2022. Mace's campaign ran advertising attacking her position on adolescent gender-identity care; Andrews said she did not support surgery for anyone under 18, took unpaid leave from her hospital job, and increased her personal security. The same race, re-run four years later at Senate scale against a candidate who is not an incumbent in the normal sense, is a reasonably controlled comparison. ## Path to the 2026 race She announced on **29 May 2025**, originally as a challenger to [[Lindsey Graham]], citing the appointment of [[Robert F. Kennedy Jr.]] as Health Secretary as a reason for running. The race she announced into no longer exists: Graham won renomination on 9 June 2026, died in office on **11 July 2026**, Governor [[Henry McMaster]] appointed his sister [[Darline Graham]] to the seat, and Darline Graham won the Republican special-primary runoff on **25 August 2026** with 52.4% over Representative [[Ralph Norman]]'s 47.6%. If elected, Andrews would be the first woman elected to represent South Carolina in the Senate — a distinction Darline Graham already holds by appointment, so the general election decides only whether the first *elected* one is a Democrat. ## Politics She became politically active after the 2018 Parkland shooting, joined Moms Demand Action, and has published research on gun violence as a pediatric injury problem. In April 2023 she founded a PAC, "Their Future. Our Vote.", to back candidates who campaign on children's interests. Her endorsements include 314 Action Fund, EMILYs List and Vote Mama. ## Polling > [!warning] Four polls, two sponsors, no consensus — do not average these > All located general-election polling is from late August 2026 and the houses disagree. Listed separately on purpose; blending them would manufacture a number no pollster published. | Pollster | Dates | Sample | Graham | Andrews | |---|---|---|---|---| | Abacus Data | Aug 26–28, 2026 | 306 LV | 55% | 42% | | Abacus Data | Aug 26–28, 2026 | 500 RV | 47% | 48% | | Impact Research (D) | Aug 18–24, 2026 | 700 LV | 41% | 41% | | Impact Research (D) | Aug 14–22, 2026 | 900 LV | 39% | 42% | Abacus released two different samples showing two different leaders. The two Impact Research polls are Democratic-sponsored. > [!warning] Unresolved — the October polling claim > [[Bill Kristol]], writing in [[The Bulwark]] on 5–6 October 2026, described "new polls" showing Andrews competitive, and Heather Cox Richardson's letter of 6 October 2026 relayed that framing. **No October poll of this race could be located independently.** The August polls above are consistent with "competitive," so the claim is plausible and unverified rather than contradicted. ## See Also - [[SC-Sen-2026]] — the race - [[Darline Graham]] — the Republican nominee and appointed incumbent - [[Lindsey Graham]] — the senator whose death reset the race - [[Nancy Mace]] — her 2022 opponent