The politics of Conway, SC have been an integral part of the city’s history since its incorporation in 1883. The city government is made up of a Mayor and six City Council members who are elected to serve four-year terms. The current mayor is Barbara Jo Blain-Bellamy and the City Council includes Robert S. Anderson, Ken Benson, Charlotte Bessent, Teresa Harris-McCaskill, John Perry and William Goldfinch III. Each year local elections are held to determine who will represent the citizens of Conway in office. These elections are highly contested and often involve large amounts of media coverage surrounding key political issues facing the community. Overall, politics in Conway are vibrant and often involve passionate debates between candidates on opposing sides about how best to address local concerns such as economic development, public safety and infrastructure improvements.
The political climate in Conway, SC is somewhat conservative.
Horry County, SC is very conservative. In Horry County, SC 32.9% of the people voted Democrat in the last presidential election, 66.1% voted for the Republican Party, and the remaining 1.0% voted Independent.
In the last Presidential election, Horry county remained overwhelmingly Republican, 66.1% to 32.9%.
Horry county voted Republican in every Presidential election since 2000.
The BestPlaces liberal/conservative index
Conway, SC is somewhat conservative.
Horry County, South Carolina is very conservative.
Myrtle Beach-Conway-North Myrtle Beach Metro Area is strongly conservative.
South Carolina is somewhat conservative.
The BestPlaces liberal/conservative index is based on recent voting in national elections, federal campaign contributions by local residents, and consumer personality profiles.
VoteWord™
Displaying 20 years of Presidential voting, visualized in one word.
Conway, South Carolina: R R R R R R
How It Works:
Here at BestPlaces, we were looking at the voting patterns since the 2000 election and realized that we could express the results of each election as one letter. R if the Republican Party candidate won, D if the Democratic Party candidate won and I if the Independent Party candidate won. The six elections (2000, 2004, 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020) would be expressed as six-letter word (R R D R R).
Then we went a little further and added the dimension of magnitude. If the difference of victory was greater than 10 percent, the letter is upper case, and lower case if the difference was less than 10 percent. This allows us to see interesting voting patterns at just a glance.
Here's the VoteWord for Iowa d r d d r. In the last six elections the state has been closely contested, voting narrowly for the Republican Party candidate in 2016 and 2020 after voting for the Democratic Party in 2008 and 2012. Virginia (r r d d d D) has voted for the Democratic Party in the last three elections.
Individual Campaign Contributions in Conway, SC
In the last 4 years (2018-2021), there were 2,206 contributions totaling $140,044 to the Democratic Party and liberal campaigns, averaging $63 per contribution.
In the last 4 years, there were 1,271 contributions totaling $261,802 to the Republican Party and conservative campaigns, averaging $206 per contribution.
(source: Federal Election Commission)