It’s a bill that could shift the balance of power in local elections.

Proposed by State House Speaker Jay Lucas, Bill H. 3444 proposes the South Carolina Election Commission be given ‘plenary authority to supervise and standardize the performance, conduct, and practices of the county board of elections and voter registration . You can read the full text of the bill here.

“We conduct elections in Charleston County,” said Isaac Cramer, Project Manager for the Charleston County Board of Elections. “The State Election Commission is in Columbia. You’re asking them to oversee 46 counties with complete authority and they may not know all the nuance of what’s going on across the state.”

He believes the bills one-size-fits-all approach wouldn’t work well.

“One county might have a way of doing something that our county doesn’t do and that kind of takes away from our local boards,” he said. “We should be the ones to see what happens in Charleston County. We know he people here. we know the voters, we’ve heard from them, we do service every single day.”

South Carolina’s State Election Commission is made up of five people. One a Republican, one a Democrat, and the remaining three are appointed by the governor.

H. 3444 originally included language that would expand the commission to nine people, but that was taken out of the bill’s most recent version.

The bill passed the SC House on March 10th with a vote of 84-36.

“The last thing we want to have is people feel like their vote doesn’t matter,” said State Rep. Mark Smith of Berkeley County. Smith co-sponsored H. 3444 and voted in favor of the bill.

“The legislation has two goals,” Smith said. “One, making sure we maintain the integrity of each vote that’s cast, and two making sure elections are run consistently in each of our counties.”

When asked if it was a coincidence the legislation comes at the same time as election changes in Georgia and proposes in other states, Smith said “I don’t there’s any coincidence as we look at the integrity of our elections”.

“This is just another way to suppress folks from voting,” said State Representative JA Moore, who voted against the bill. “Republicans in South Carolina are trying to take preemptive actions to make sure they can suppress voters from changing the landscape in South Carolina. ”

He believes the bill gives far too much power to the state election commission.

“Only one member is of the opposite party right now. The Republicans are in control, that means one member is a Democrat. It’s just not representative of the state of South Carolina.”

Ultimately, Isaac Cramer believes local election commissions already fulfill the role H. 3444 is attempting to take.

“This is something we already do,” he said. “It’s such a joy to see people across the board exercising their right to vote. That’s their voice. We’re the gatekeepers of Democracy.”