Justin Evans@SCJustinEvans
Clyburn has represented the Sixth Congressional District for thirty-four years. He held the third-highest position in the U.S. House for a decade of them.
Now ask what his district has to show for it.
Same man, same seat since January 1993. House Majority Whip. Assistant Democratic Leader. By any measure of personal Washington power, Clyburn pulled every lever a member of Congress can pull. The lever he pulled hardest was the one that protected his own seat. Four redistricting cycles. Four maps drawn around him.
He used the rest of that power to deliver South Carolina the first Democratic presidential primary in the country. He used it to make himself the kingmaker who picked Joe Biden. He used it to build a national brand. The voters of the Sixth, who deserved a fighter, got a fundraiser.
The standard defense is that one congressman can’t fix everything. Nobody asked him to fix everything. We’re asking what thirty-four years of the most powerful Democrat south of the Mason-Dixon was actually for, if not for the district that sent him.
The map was drawn to guarantee him the seat. The seat got him a national career. The career never came back to the voters who paid for it.
The bill on the floor this week stops drawing the lines around the brand and starts drawing them around the people who deserved better.
Pass the bill.
