South Carolina, Nevada, North Dakota primaries and Ohio special election 2024: Nancy Mace, Sam Brown win

Democrats nearly won a safely Republican congressional seat.

June 11 was another packed primary day, as voters in South Carolina, Maine, North Dakota and Nevada weighed in on who will make the ballot this fall. We had our eyes on a slew of Republican primaries on Tuesday, including several competitive contests for U.S. House seats, as well as contests to pick Nevada's GOP Senate nominee and effectively pick the next governor of North Dakota.

In South Carolina, Rep. Nancy Mace's Trumpian pivot didn't cost her, as she handily fended off an establishment-aligned primary challenger. Fellow incumbent Rep. William Timmons, who was looking vulnerable after an infidelity scandal, also came out ahead in a closer race against his right-wing challenger. In North Dakota's At-Large Congressional District, Julie Fedorchak became the first non-incumbent woman this cycle to win a GOP primary for a safely red seat. In Nevada, Republican voters chose Sam Brown as their candidate to challenge incumbent Democratic Sen. Jacky Rosen this fall.

Finally, a special election is set to give House Republicans one more seat of breathing room, as voters in Ohio's 6th District filled the seat vacated by Rep. Bill Johnson's departure in January — though not without some unexpected suspense.

As usual, 538 reporters and contributors broke down the election results as they came in with live updates, analysis and commentary. Read our full live blog below.


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Is Brown a good candidate?

I'm not yet sold on Brown being a better than average Senate candidate. I think he's done a good job of staying under the radar relative to other GOP nominees in Montana, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Arizona, and avoided some of the missteps those candidates have made. (It doesn't hurt that Nevada is the perpetual redheaded stepchild of the Senate battlefield, always there but never paid much attention.) But he's still relatively untested. His political record includes failed bids for Texas state House a decade ago and for Senate two years ago. If he does ultimately win, I think it has a lot more to do with Trump's performance in the state than Brown's special strength.

—Jacob Rubashkin, Inside Elections


Is Rosen vulnerable in November?

Nathaniel mentioned that Rosen's senate seat could be the GOP's best pick-up opportunity outside the Big Three red states (West Virginia, Montana and Ohio). I think that's right. Brown doesn't seem to have any strange local scandals (unlike Sheehy in Montana, for instance)>, so the Nevada GOP didn't Dr. Oz itself here. Although Brown isn't originally from Nevada, he has a compelling personal story as a combat veteran, who suffered third-degree burns from a 2008 roadside bomb explosion in Afghanistan.

Of course, Nevada Democrats have dug up a few possible scandals and will focus on the abortion issue. On his website, Brown mentions that he is personally pro-life, but would not support national abortion ban because it would overturn the decision of Nevadans, so he's trying to thread that needle. Brown's wife has also been telling her abortion story so the Brown campaign must recognize that this will be a salient issue.

—Meredith Conroy, 538 contributor


Results in Nevada show Trump might get a sweep tonight on endorsements

In the 11 races where Trump has endorsed a candidate, eight of Trump’s picks have won, including Sam Brown in the Nevada Senate GOP primary. One of the former president’s endorsees is going to a runoff, and the remaining two — including John Lee in Nevada’s 4th District — are leading their races. This adds to Trump’s, as he put it recently, “very unblemished” track record. So far this primary season, only one of Trump’s picks for congressional or gubernatorial races has lost (Christine Serrano Glassner, whom Trump endorsed for the GOP Senate primary in New Jersey), so tonight may very well continue that trend.

Kaleigh Rogers, 538


Lee leading, Flippo following

In Nevada's 4th District, former North Las Vegas Mayor John Lee is leading the GOP primary, 51 to 42 percent, over Air Force veteran David Flippo, with a little less than half the expected vote counted. Lee, a former Democrat, has an endorsement from Trump. Either would be an underdog against Horsford, who weathered targeted races in 2020 and 2022.

—Jacob Rubashkin, Inside Elections


The Republican primary in North Dakota will likely pick the state's next governor

North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum's retirement has precipitated an expensive and increasingly ugly Republican primary for governor between Rep. Kelly Armstrong and Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller. Armstrong is more familiar to voters, having served in Congress since 2019, while Burgum tapped Miller as his new lieutenant governor in December 2022. Both candidates have thrown around large sums of their own money: Based on financial reports though May 2 and large donations reported through June 7, about $3.8 million of the $4.2 million Miller has reported raising has come out of her own pocket, while Armstrong has self-funded almost $1.3 million of the $3.4 million he's collected.

Armstrong is the front-runner, having garnered endorsements from Trump and the state GOP. He also held a clear lead in three different surveys conducted in May, all of which showed him receiving close to 60 percent while Miller only attracted around 20 percent. Looking to gain ground, Miller has tried to link herself to Trump and Burgum, who's endorsed her. She's also run negative ads against Armstrong, including one that Rob Port of InForum described as "the most brutal" he'd seen in North Dakota that accuses Armstrong of insider trading and defending a child molester when he was a lawyer. Armstrong's campaign called the insider trading claim a lie, and the victims in the molestation case called for Miller to stop running ads about it. And Armstrong isn't without his own ad controversy, as his campaign ran a spot against Miller that included a citation from an artificial intelligence news website, which prompted Miller to criticize Armstrong for running "fake news" about her record.

—Geoffrey Skelley, 538