SC Alan Wilson wants to redraw SC Congressional lines interview with Tara

What this episode covers

00:02 Joining me now is South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson. Good morning, sir. Good morning, Terrence. Great to be on your program again. Thanks for having me. Absolutely. Had to have you on after I saw your news release in your tweet yesterday. You are going in the opposite direction of Governor Henry McMaster writing, fully support Donald Trump's call to redraw South Carolina's congressional lines. The General Assembly is the legal authority to do so. 00:32 Tell us about that. You're kind of going in a different direction. It appears than the governor this morning. He's saying he won't call a special session. Tell us about what's going on here. Well, Tara, mean, first off, blue states, red states all over the country are doing this very thing. They're trying to reflect the will of the voters that elected them. The blue states are going to redraw their lines, which they are allowed to do. The red states are doing it. Louisiana just got cleared. 00:59 about the U.S. Supreme Court to do this. This was a case that I was actually involved in and supporting. again, if the state legislature, if the people of South Carolina want their districts redrawn to reflect the will of the people, the legislature is their elected representatives, then the legislature is duty bound to do that. And I fully, 1000 % support the legislature doing that. President Trump's agenda is going to be threatened if they don't do it. And I support uh redrawing these lines to reflect the will of the people of South Carolina. 01:26 So you were part of the Supreme Court case that was just decided that said no more use of race to draw districts, correct? That is correct. I was also involved in a US Supreme Court case about two or three years ago that redrew the district lines for the first congressional district. again, under the same Supreme Court legal review, we argued that you should have race neutral reasons for redrawing lines. Political reasons are pure 01:56 perfectly acceptable and other states are doing it in South Carolina has every right to do it if they choose to and if they do it I stand ready to defend the legislature's redrawing of the lines if that's what they seek to do. Do you should Governor McMaster call a special session here? Look I you know as governor if that's what the legislature did I would 100 % call 02:21 a special session to make sure that the will of the people is enacted. Again, it's about us doing the people's business and I'm running for governor to try to effectuate the will of the people of South Carolina. When I travel the state, the people want the president's agenda implemented. uh The president needs a congress that will get that agenda done and uh protect us from a lot of the stuff that you see the Democrats do when they get in power. The first thing they're going to do is they're going to try to impeach the president. They're going to try to 02:47 basically throw a wrench into the machinery of government and try to stop us from being able to, you know, implement America first agenda. Um, I think we need to stop that again. I am 1000 % opposed to discriminating on the basis of race, but drawing lines based on the will of the people on political lines is perfectly legal and constitutional. And the legislature has a right to do that. And if they do that, then I'm going to defend it. And which, and you mean. 03:16 Because your job as attorney general, you would be the guy who would defend the new Correct. As attorney general, I would defend it. As governor, I would sign it. And when you say you would sign it, would you sign a 7-0 district plan to get rid of the Clavirants district? Yeah, absolutely. OK. And you just said a minute ago, going back if I understand you correctly, 03:39 you kind of stop short, it sounds like, of calling for McMaster to call a special session. You said, you know, he should do what the legislature wants. Should the legislative leaders demand a special session to red ...