The Tax Bill Moved, the Budget Is Coming, and the Supreme Court Race Just Got Real

Week of February 23, 2026  |  South Carolina General Assembly, 126th Session

Week 7 at the South Carolina State House was one of those weeks where the headline told only half the story.

Yes, the big income tax bill moved. Yes, the budget clock is ticking louder. And yes, the Supreme Court race has officially crossed from legislative intrigue into something that matters well beyond the State House.

Here's what you need to know.

H. 4216 Passed the Senate. Sort Of.

South Carolina's income tax restructuring bill cleared the Senate 39-5 on second reading February 24 and passed third reading February 25.

The Senate tweaked the bill. The top rate came down slightly from 5.39% to 5.21%, and the Senate added a provision dedicating 25% of recurring income tax revenue surplus to additional tax relief. With that change, the bill now heads back to the House, which must decide whether to accept the Senate's version as-is or send it to a conference committee to work out the differences.

What does the bill actually do? It restructures South Carolina's individual income tax into a two-tier system: 1.99% on taxable income under $30,000 and 5.21% on everything above. It eliminates the federal standard and itemized deductions and replaces them with a new South Carolina Income Adjusted Deduction. The goal, baked into a trigger mechanism, is to eventually ratchet both rates down to zero if state income tax revenue grows at least 5% annually.

The Revenue and Fiscal Affairs Office estimates about 77% of taxpayers see a lower bill. The roughly 23% who see no change or a higher one tend to be middle-income earners who currently benefit most from itemized deductions.

The Budget Is No Longer Background Noise

The House will spend the weeks of March 9 and beyond debating the $15.4 billion general fund spending plan Ways and Means unanimously approved in Week 6.

A few line items worth knowing: $150 million to cover cost overruns on the Scout Motors project in Blythewood, $175 million for the MUSC cancer hospital, $23.2 million for the Education Scholarship Trust Fund (the private school voucher program), and $75 million for rural and charter school capital. The Senate Finance Committee won't mark up the budget until April 6, with a full Senate budget week expected around April 20.

The Judicial Races Are Pressure Cookers With a March 4 Deadline

South Carolina's 170 legislators elect judges. The House has 124 members, the Senate 46.

The four certified candidates for the Supreme Court seat: incumbent Justice John Few, former Speaker Jay Lucas, Administrative Law Court Chief Judge Ralph Anderson III, and Appeals Court Judge Blake Hewitt. Lucas is the only one without meaningful bench experience, and by most counts he is very close to the 86 votes needed to win. The General Assembly will also elect judges to the Court of Appeals and circuit court seats on March 4.

What does this mean for you? If you have a stake in business litigation, property rights, insurance law, or pretty much any dispute that winds up before the courts, this election matters. Courts shape legal outcomes for a decade at a time.

The House Floor: What Actually Happened

H. 4762 (Ten Commandments in Classrooms): Passed the House 84-31, largely along party lines. The bill requires an 11-by-14-inch display of the Ten Commandments in every public school and college classroom by January 1, 2027, alongside other historical documents including the Mayflower Compact, Declaration of Independence, Northwest Ordinance, and Magna Carta. The debate lasted hours. Democrats offered a series of amendments to add documents honoring Reconstruction-era congressman Robert Brown Elliott and other Black historical figures. Every amendment was voted down. Rep. Justin Bamberg stood silently at the podium for his allotted time rather than speak, a quiet protest that drew more attention than most speeches do. The bill heads to the Senate.

H. 4717 (Mid-Decade Redistricting): Had its House Constitutional Laws Subcommittee hearing Wednesday. The bill, sponsored by Rep. Jordan Pace, would redraw all seven of South Carolina's congressional districts mid-cycle. Pace argued his intent was to make the sixth district more competitive, not to draw a 7-0 Republican map, and said he directed geographers to draw the maps without considering race. But the testimony told a more complicated story.

Rep. Bamberg pressed Pace on whether he held any public meetings in the affected districts before drawing the maps. Pace acknowledged the hearing itself was essentially that process. When pressed further, Pace confirmed he traveled to Washington D.C. and spoke with White House staffers about whether redistricting was a good idea before holding a single public hearing in South Carolina.

Demographer John Morgan testified that while the proposal makes District 6 more competitive on paper, shifting it from D+23 to roughly D+1, it splits 11 counties, carves Richland County into three separate districts, and creates a District 3 where it takes 4.5 hours to drive from one end to the other. He also noted that District 1, left untouched, is actually where Republicans are most vulnerable, a curious omission for a map billed as creating competition.

The subcommittee took testimony only and did not vote. House and Senate Republican leadership have already said publicly that mid-decade redistricting is not on the agenda this year. For now.

The Senate: Committee Work Worth Watching

H. 4902 (NIL FOIA Exemption): This was supposed to be a layup. H. 4902 cleared second reading 30-13 several weeks ago and looked like it was headed straight to the governor's desk. Then newspaper reporting surfaced new financial information about how universities were funding revenue-sharing deals, and the Senate hit the brakes. The full Senate Education Committee convened a special hearing on February 25.  Athletic directors from USC, Clemson, and Coastal Carolina spent two hours insisting that no public funds, no tuition money, no state appropriations are flowing into the accounts used to pay athletes.

The bill remains stuck on third reading, contested as the senators want to understand exactly what the schools are shielding from public view before they sign off.

S. 199 and H. 4756 (Student Physical Privacy Act): The Senate Education Subcommittee wrapped up its third and final hearing Tuesday with no additional public testimony. The subcommittee then made a key procedural choice: rather than advancing S. 199 (the Senate companion bill), it moved H. 4756, the House version, to the full Senate Education Committee with a favorable report as amended. S. 199 stays in subcommittee.

The practical effect is that the House bill, which already passed that chamber 96-19, is now the vehicle moving forward. These bills require students to use bathrooms and locker rooms consistent with their biological sex as verified at birth. The full Senate Education Committee is the next stop. If it clears there, it heads to the Senate floor, where a real debate awaits.

S. 540 (Child Welfare and Faith-Based Agencies): This bill continues moving through the Senate Family and Veterans' Services Committee, with Sen. Reichenbach chairing the subcommittee that has a hearing scheduled for Wednesday, March 4.

S. 540 does three things: rewrites the definition of child abuse to clarify that raising a child consistent with their biological sex is not abuse; protects individual foster and adoptive parents from state discrimination if they raise children consistent with religious beliefs or decline gender transition care; and shields faith-based agencies from being penalized for declining placements that conflict with their beliefs.

The intersection of religious liberty, parental rights, child welfare, and LGBTQ+ protections makes this one of the more legally complex bills of the session.

S. 897 (MMR Vaccine Requirement): Scheduled for a Senate Medical Affairs Committee hearing on March 4, the same day as the Supreme Court election. The bill would remove the religious exemption for the MMR vaccine for children attending public schools and extend the mandate to public colleges and universities. It also ties MMR vaccination status to eligibility for the Education Scholarship Trust Fund (the school voucher program).

House Judiciary: The Juvenile Justice Package and the HALO Bill

The full House Judiciary Committee met Tuesday, February 24, and took up several significant bills from the Juvenile Crime Ad Hoc Committee.

H. 5120 (Youth Offender Fingerprinting): Received a favorable report. The bill clarifies how juvenile fingerprint records and photographs are maintained by law enforcement, part of a broader package aimed at modernizing South Carolina's approach to juvenile justice and making records more consistent across agencies.

H. 5121 (Community Juvenile Crime Prevention Programs): Also received a favorable report. The bill establishes a community-based juvenile crime prevention program, allowing public or private nonprofit entities certified by the SC Department of Juvenile Justice to provide services aimed at preventing youth offenses before they happen. Think intervention before incarceration, a philosophy gaining bipartisan traction across the country.

H. 4763 (HALO Act -- Helping Alleviate Lawful Obstruction): Passed Judiciary 15-4, with all four no votes coming from Democrats, and is now headed to the House floor. The bill makes it a misdemeanor ($500 fine and up to 60 days) to knowingly interfere with, harass, or distract a first responder actively performing their duties, with a mandatory 25-foot buffer after a first responder's warning.

"First responder" covers law enforcement officers, firefighters, and emergency medical care providers. Sponsor Rep. Melissa Oremus (R-Aiken) was clear this is not about restricting video recording. It's about safety. The four Democrats who voted no and a USC law professor who testified aren't so sure. Similar laws in other states have been struck down as unconstitutional prior restraint on free speech.

What's Coming in Week 8 and Beyond

The House shifts heavily toward floor time to clear the calendar before budget week. Expect the HALO bill, H. 4758 (hemp ban), and a full contested calendar to drive floor debate in the coming weeks.

In the Senate, the two hearings to watch most closely are S. 540 (child welfare, faith-based agencies, and parental rights, Sen. Reichenbach's subcommittee, March 4) and S. 897 (MMR vaccine, Senate Medical Affairs, March 4). Both land in a week that already includes the Supreme Court election.

The judicial elections are Wednesday, March 4. Whatever the outcome, the ripple effects on South Carolina's legal landscape will be felt for years.

And the reminder that never gets old: Sine Die is May 14. That's 11 weeks away.

The Bottom Line

Week 7 delivered a landmark moment on taxes, a budget that's about to dominate the conversation, a Supreme Court race that's turned into a genuine test of institutional integrity, and a House Judiciary week that touched everything from juvenile justice to your right to stand on the sidewalk and film a cop.

The social policy debates are driving public testimony and media attention. The fiscal policy debates are driving the state's trajectory. And the procedural moves happening in subcommittees right now are setting up the headlines of April and May.

The question is always the same: who's in the room when the decisions get made? That's what Alpha Strategies does. We're in those rooms, tracking the bills, and making sure our clients aren't caught off guard when the calendar moves faster than anyone expected.

If you're not sure where your issues stand or what's coming next, let's talk. The clock is real.

Alpha Strategies tracks South Carolina's legislative process week by week -- not just what happened, but what it means and what's coming next.