By Shellie Murdaugh
The Island News
Anxious candidates, including Dixie Ford, nervously awaited results of the Tuesday, Nov. 3 General Election in Jasper County at the Jasper County Board of Election and Voter Registration Office.
Ford was seeking the Jasper County Probate Judge seat, a seat which had long been held by her opponent, Buster Kleckley.
The two candidates had worked together for many years and were now vying for the same seat.
When results were revealed, Ford was with her family rechecking the numbers several times to make sure what she was seeing had actually happened.
“I won!” she said to her family and friends who had gathered at the office.
In unofficial results, Ford received 8,964 votes to defeat Kleckley who had 8,293 votes. Election results will be certified Friday, Nov. 6. A total of 17,543 ballots were cast in Jasper County during the election. There are 35,014 registered voters in Jasper County and 50 percent of the county’s voters cast their ballots.
Ford will take office in January.
“I’m ready to get to work,” Ford said. “I am ready to hit the ground running.”
While Ford will be the first female elected to serve as Jasper County Probate Judge, there was one other female who was appointed to the position by Gov. Nikki Haley in 2012. Brenda K. Horton was appointed after Judge Joey Malphrus resigned. She served for close to a year until being defeated in the November 2012 general election by Kleckley for the position.
Kleckley held the seat for the past 14 years, and Ford has served as Associate Probate Judge for 19 years.
“This was an incredibly close race and I’m beyond grateful for the outstanding support I received,” Kleckley said after the election. “Although the result is not what we hoped for, my love for Jasper County hasn’t changed. It’s my home and I’ll always be grateful for the chance to serve it.”
Kleckley said after the election he was not sure of his future plans.
Shellie Murdaugh, who joined The Island News in October 2026, formerly worked as a reporter for The Jasper County Sun Times and Bluffton Today. She also worked for newspapers in Hampton and Colleton counties in South Carolina and in North Carolina at The Richmond County Daily Journal. She can be reached at shelliemurdaugh@gmail.com.