Donald Trump has reportedly found a groundbreaking new strategy to fix a small, nagging problem: losing.
After a stretch where his endorsements haven’t exactly been printing political destiny —think Iowa, think Georgia— Trump is now poised to claim victory in South Carolina no matter how the Republican governor’s runoff actually shakes out.
Because why pick a winner when you can just… declare them all winners?
For years, Trump has leaned on the idea that his endorsement is basically political Excalibur: point it at a candidate and watch them ascend. In reality, the “unbeaten record” is doing a lot of heavy lifting—built mostly on endorsing incumbents already cruising to victory or jumping in late to back whoever was clearly going to win anyway.
But South Carolina offered a different kind of problem: actual competition.
Trump originally backed sitting Lieutenant Governor Pamela Evette ahead of the June 9 primary. She came in first, but barely—landing just under 29 percent and missing an outright majority by a mile. Hot on her heels was Attorney General Alan Wilson, who didn’t just survive the primary but emerged looking stronger in the runoff matchup.
Polling since then hasn’t been subtle. Wilson has been leading Evette by anywhere from high single digits to a full-on double-digit blowout, depending on the survey.
So naturally, Trump made a strategic adjustment worthy of a man who refuses to acknowledge the concept of contradiction: he endorsed both of them.
“I can’t hurt one of them by only Endorsing the other, so, therefore, I am going to Endorse, for Governor of South Carolina, both Pam Evette and Alan Wilson!” he wrote on social media. “It’s a Wealth of Riches – With either one you can’t go wrong. Vote for Pam or Alan.”
Which is, structurally speaking, how runoffs do not work. There are exactly two candidates. That’s the whole point. Picking one is not optional—it’s literally the mechanism.
But in Trump’s version of political physics, endorsement isn’t about choice anymore. It’s about retroactive credit assignment. If you back everyone, you can’t possibly be wrong. And if you can’t be wrong, you can’t lose.
Even if, technically, somebody still does.
