Russell Fry said Donald Trump first signaled support for him, then backed Darline Graham Nordone in the 2026 U.S. Senate special election. Fry said the shift came after he had expected to be the candidate Trump would help in the race for the seat left open by Lindsey Graham’s death.
Fry said, “I’ve always, since the endorsement when I ran for congress, enjoyed a really good relationship with the president.” He also said, “Impeachment was deeply personal to him, and I think the more that comes out about what happened, the more vindicated he is on the grounds of impeachment.”
Donald Trump and Russell Fry
Fry tied that relationship back to 2022, when Trump endorsed him in Fry’s campaign against Tom Rice. He said that history helped explain why there were early signals that he might be the candidate Trump would back again.
He described the earlier support as part of a pattern that had been building since his first race for U.S. Congress. In the special election, though, Trump moved to Darline Graham Nordone instead.
Lindsey Graham and the special election
Fry said Lindsey Graham had a much closer line to Trump than he did. “If I talked to him, say, once a month or once every couple of weeks – Lindsey was talking to him every day,” he said.
That comparison is the clearest explanation Fry offered for the endorsement shift. He said the question was not whether he had access, but what happened inside the White House and those discussions that changed the outcome.
Stephen Federico and Russell Fry
Fry also said he is younger than Ralph Norman and argued that voters respond to that difference. “They like that I’m younger,” he said, adding, “They like that there’s a fresh conservative energy that can go toe-to-toe with somebody like a Jasmine Crockett.”
He said voters also like that there might be an opportunity that he is not just serving one term. Separately, Stephen Federico has endorsed Fry after Logan Hailey Federico was murdered sixteen months ago in an apartment near the Univers.
The endorsement change leaves Fry trying to hold together his case to voters around three themes: his earlier backing from Trump, his age compared with Ralph Norman, and the support of Stephen Federico. The race now turns on which of those lines carries more weight after Trump moved his support to Darline Graham Nordone.
