Marijuana Moment: South Carolina GOP Governor Candidates Are Open To Signing Medical Marijuana Legalization Bill, They Say During Debate

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The two South Carolina Republican candidates in a runoff election for their party’s nomination to serve as the state’s next governor say they are open to signing legislation to legalize medical marijuana if elected to the job.

The moderator of a debate on Tuesday noted that “even ruby red states” are moving to allow medical cannabis use, pressing both contenders on whether they believe there is a pathway for it to be legalized in South Carolina.

Pamela Evette, currently the state’s lieutenant governor, said her father died a “horrible death” from lung cancer and that “if I could have given him something that would have eased his pain in the last few days of his life, I would have done it.”

“If the General Assembly can bring me, as governor, a piece of legislation that doesn’t end up being an open door to recreational use, I would heavily sit down and look at that,” she said.

“But I would bring in experts and doctors to make sure that we can tighten that to really just help people who medically need it, people who have tried everything and people who are sitting in the last minutes of their life—because nobody should have to watch their loved one die in pain,” Evette said.

She also noted that she and incumbent Gov. Henry McMaster (R) have already worked “very close” with law enforcement on the issue—though comprehensive medical cannabis legislation has never reached the governor’s desk in South Carolina.

Alan Wilson, who currently serves as state attorney general, said during Tuesday’s debate that he “would be open to on the medical side. ”

“I have always taken the position and agree with what the Trump administration did,” he said. “The Trump administration called for the rescheduling of marijuana from a Schedule I to a Schedule III. What that means is it can be studied for medical application, which it couldn’t, as a Schedule I drug.”

“I have met with so many veterans who are suffering from PTSD, people that I’ve actually served with in Iraq. I have met with people suffering with seizures, people suffering with chronic illness, people suffering, people who are terminal,” Wilson said. “And if there is a possibility that we could derive some use from the medical application of that, then South Carolina should follow suit with what the federal government is doing, and have clearly defined laws and regulations that prevent it from being abused. I would be open to the medical use of it.”

Like Evette, the attorney general noted, however, that he does not support legalizing marijuana for recreational use.

“Obviously, I’ve spoken with law enforcement leaders all over the country, as well as elected leaders, both in the Republican and Democratic parties, who have told me, ‘whatever you do, do not have recreational marijuana,'” he said. “They can’t say that publicly in their home states, but they said it has been an absolute disaster.”

The primary runoff election between the two candidates is on Tuesday.

Democratic gubernatorial nominee Jermaine Johnson, currently a state representative, says on his campaign website that “it’s time for South Carolina to make medicinal marijuana safe, legal, and accessible.”

“This means more jobs and income for farmers, a state wide tax on cannabis that will allow us to balance the budget, and medical freedom for people who are suffering,” it says. “Additionally, Jermaine will commute the sentence of all prisoners who have non-violent marijuana related charges. This will relieve the burden on our state’s prison system and restore families who have been destroyed by punitive and antiquated drug policies.”

The campaign also says Johnson would seek to “put recreational cannabis to a state-wide referendum.”

We need a smarter approach to marijuana policy.

Legalize medical use.
Pardon non-violent charges.
Let the people decide recreational use through a statewide referendum.

Compassion. Fairness. Accountability.https://t.co/gWBw9vMJ3w pic.twitter.com/7A9n4reVSS

— Jermaine Johnson (@Dr_JLJohnson) April 20, 2026

Republican candidates for South Carolina attorney general recently clashed on medical cannabis and hemp issues during a debate.

Meanwhile, a Republican South Carolina state senator said that “medical marijuana is now legal” in the state following the Trump administration’s move to enact federal rescheduling.

State Sen. Tom Davis (R), who has sponsored bills to legalize medical cannabis over a number of sessions, said that under a little-known state law he believes was triggered by federal rescheduling, “we have just become the 41st state that has a legally authorized medical marijuana program.”

State statute says that “if a substance is added, deleted, or rescheduled as a controlled substance pursuant to federal law or regulation,” officials then have 30 days to reschedule the drug in the “appropriate schedule” under state law.

A separate law, the South Carolina Controlled Substances Therapeutic Research Act, passed in 1980, sets up a program through which certain patients could obtain medical cannabis “through whatever means” the state health commissioner “deems most appropriate consistent with federal law.”

The governor’s office confirmed to local media that South Carolina law will “require the State to mirror the new federal order” on marijuana rescheduling. And the South Carolina Department of Public Health (DPH) said that officials are “aware of the proposed rescheduling of medical marijuana from Schedule I to Schedule III under the Controlled Substances Act” and are “assessing the impacts to DPH and the state of South Carolina.”

Last year, South Carolina’s governor said there’s a “compelling” case to be made for legalizing medical marijuana in the state, despite reservations from law enforcement.

“I think what we need to do is study it very carefully, get as much information as we can and try to do the right thing,” he said.

The office of House Speaker Murrell Smith (R) tempered expectations, however, referencing what he viewed as insufficient support within the GOP caucus to advance the reform through his chamber.

An earlier version of Davis’s cannabis measure passed the Senate in the 2024 session but was never taken up in the House. He filed a new version for the 2025 session, but it did not advance.

“It requires doctors in patient authorization, doctor supervision,” Davis said at the time. “It requires pharmacists to dispense it. It is a very conservative bill, because that’s what South Carolinians want.”

As introduced, the legislation would allow patients to access medical marijuana from “therapeutic cannabis pharmacies,” which would be licensed by the state Board of Pharmacy. Individuals would need to receive a doctor’s recommendation for the treatment of certain qualifying conditions, which include several specific ailments as well as terminal illnesses and chronic diseases where opioids are the standard of care.

Among the public, medical marijuana legalization enjoys overwhelming bipartisan support in the state, with a 2024 poll finding that 93 percent of Democrats, 74 percent of Republicans and 84 percent of independents back the reform.

The state Senate passed an earlier version of the legislation in 2022, but it stalled in the opposite body over a procedural hiccup.

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When senators began debating the medical marijuana legislation in 2024, the body adopted an amendment that clarifies the bill does not require landlords or people who control property to allow vaporization of cannabis products.

As debate on the legislation continued, members clashed over whether the current version of the legislation contains major differences from an earlier iteration that the body passed in 2022.

Certain lawmakers have also raised concerns that medical cannabis legalization would lead to broader reform to allow adult-use marijuana, that it could put pharmacists with roles in dispensing cannabis in jeopardy and that federal law could preempt the state’s program, among other worries.

After Davis’s Senate-passed medical cannabis bill was blocked in the House in 2022, he tried another avenue for the reform proposal, but that similarly failed on procedural grounds.

The lawmaker has called the stance of his own party, particularly as it concerns medical marijuana, “an intellectually lazy position that doesn’t even try to present medical facts as they currently exist.”

Photo courtesy of Max Pixel.

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