South Carolina Daily Gazette

South Carolina has at least four large data center projects in the works, collectively needing an estimated 800 megawatts of power daily. But advocates for consumers also have questioned deals utilities and county governments have made with data center developers. “Data centers are doing nothing to deserve a special deal,” Lynn Teague, a lobbyist for the League of Women Voters, previously told the SC Daily Gazette. “They should at least make them pay their way.”

WACH Fox 57 News

Carolina For All held a press conference to emphasize the importance of fair and safe elections, along with State Representative Jermaine Johnson. Johnson has two proposed bills focusing on the protection of poll workers and elections.

Lynn Teague with the South Carolina League of Women Voters says they lost five county election directors last year due to lack of protection. "In many cases, all of the pressure and ugliness around elections these days is one of the reasons, we even had one county that had to shut down their election office for a week because they had nobody left," said Teague.

The Statehouse Report

A controversial bill that promises to meet South Carolina’s growing energy needs by ramping up in-state power production is headed to the S.C. House floor next week with bipartisan support, despite fierce opposition from many of the state’s leading consumer and environmental groups. “We absolutely understand there’s a need for more energy generation,” S.C. League of Women Voters President Lynn Teague told Statehouse Report. “But the General Assembly should not be intruding on the decisions that are supposed to be made by state regulatory agencies.” Of particular concern, she said, were a provision allowing utilities to meet with regulators behind closed doors, and the decision to put economic interests, rather than the concerns of ratepayers, at the heart of the regulatory process. “When government grants a monopoly to utilities, it’s giving them a very big asset,” Teague said. “And it’s the state’s absolute responsibility to protect the public from abuse of that asset.”

South Carolina Daily Gazette

A controversial energy bill is heading to the House floor over the continued opposition of consumer and environmental advocates, who say changes fell far short of addressing concerns over fast-tracking a new power plant in South Carolina. Lynn Teague, a lobbyist for the League of Women Voters, said the new language is better in that it does not so flagrantly overstep regulators. “However, the message is still there that the General Assembly has already made its decision and wants it to be rubber-stamped,” Teague said.