CHARLESTON, S.C. — The Associated Press projected Lacore as the winner at 6:51 p.m. Friday. With 99% of expected votes counted, Lacore led Republican Jenny Costa Honeycutt 49.7% to 48.6%, according to AP election results. The win flips the seat Rep. Nancy Mace is vacating.
Honeycutt is an attorney and a member of the Charleston County Council. Mace did not seek reelection in the district, which covers Charleston and much of the state’s coastline. She ran for governor over the summer instead, and lost.
A 35-year Navy career
Lacore spent 35 years in the Navy. She flew helicopters early in her career and ended it as a three-star admiral and chief of the Navy Reserve.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth removed her from that post in August 2025, roughly a year after she took it. She has said she was given no explanation. She was among more than a dozen senior officers Hegseth ousted last year, and she has criticized his purge of Pentagon leaders and his handling of military promotions.
Before her removal, she had never considered running for office. She told former Democratic National Committee chair Jaime Harrison on his podcast in September that she ran in part for her six children.
“Service has been my life and this is just another way to serve,”
She has not hidden her view of Hegseth. “I did not from the moment he was confirmed,” she said on the podcast, asked whether she thought he was qualified to be defense secretary. “And I think he’s just demonstrating that, over and over and over.”
A Hegseth impeachment vote ahead
Lacore has said she wants a seat on the Armed Services Committee. She would arrive in the House as it weighs Hegseth’s future: Rep. Thomas Massie introduced an impeachment measure against Hegseth in September and plans to force a vote on it next week.
Her race was part of a wider surge of veterans running this year. With Honor Action counted 258 veteran candidates on the ballot, up 21% from 2024. A record 38 of them were women, up 81% from two years ago, and women made up 15% of the veteran candidates, up from 10%.
Mace congratulated Lacore on X before the race was called and promised a smooth transition.
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