Former South Carolina WR Moe Brown Wins Democratic Primary for US House Seat

Former South Carolina wide receiver Moe Brown is one step closer to earning a seat in Congress. 

The Gamecocks alum won the democratic primary for the 5th District of South Carolina on Tuesday, defeating Sidney Moore for the right to face off against republican incumbent Ralph Norman, who has held the seat since 2017. 

Brown, who played under Steve Spurrier at SC from 2006 to 2009, ran on policies ranging from expanding the Affordable Care Act, healthcare as a right, automatic voter registration upon turning 18 and reducing the cost of higher education. 

During his time at South Carolina, Brown, a team captain, appeared in 49 games for the Gamecocks, compiling 1,124 total receiving yards on 85 catches with four career touchdowns—three in his senior year.

Brown was one of Spurrier's first recruits when he got to Columbia, passing up on offers from Maryland and Tennessee to help lay the building blocks for a team that would win the SEC East one year after his graduation. 

At South Carolina, Brown earned a degree in marketing and finance and later worked for Republican Gov. Nikki Haley at the Department of Commerce, where his website says he helped deliver more than 5,000 jobs and over a billion dollars in economic development to rural towns. 

The Anderson, South Carolina, native will now work to win a seat previously held by Mick Mulvaney, who left his position to assume a number of roles in the Donald Trump Administration. Mulvaney has since been named acting director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, Office of Management and Budget, and from January 2019 to March 31, 2020, acting White House Chief of Staff. 

Mulvaney was elected with 59.2 percent of the vote in the general election back in 2016. After Mulvaney was named to his role at the OMB, Norman resigned as a state representative to campaign for the seat, winning the Republican nomination by just 221 votes before defeating Democrat Archie Parnell in a special election in 2017 with 51.04 percent of the vote. 

Norman defeated Parnell again in the 2018 general election with 57.03 percent of the vote, though the democratic party broke with Parnell after reports of domestic abuse surfaced a few months before the election.