South Carolina Veterans Preference in State Employment

Start with what is not there. There is no veterans preference in Chapter 11 of Title 8, which is the state employees chapter. There is none in Chapter 7 of Title 8, which is military absences. There is none in Chapter 11 of Title 25, which is the Department of Veterans' Affairs chapter. A sweep of the state employment provisions for "veteran" comes back empty. South Carolina's veterans preference in state employment is an administrative policy. The Department of Administration announced it effective January 1, 2021, and the Department of Veterans' Affairs publishes it: hiring state agencies and institutions must interview at least one qualified veteran for every full-time equivalent position posted. That is the entire benefit. Read what it is not. It is not points. There is no five-point or ten-point credit added to an examination score, and South Carolina does not run a competitive register for most positions. It is not a ranking. A veteran is not placed above a non-veteran of equal qualification, and there is no tie-breaker rule. It is not an offer, or even a guarantee of consideration in the ordinary case. It is a guarantee that one qualified veteran gets an interview. If four veterans apply, the agency satisfies the policy by interviewing one of them. It is not enforceable in the way a statute would be. A policy adopted by a state agency under its own authority can be amended or withdrawn by that agency, and it does not create the private right of action that a statutory preference in most states does. And it carries no removal protection. Several states in this catalog attach a hearing right and a for-cause standard to a veteran in public employment. South Carolina attaches none. To use it, a veteran submits the DD Form 214 with the state employment application, must meet the minimum training and experience requirements for the position, and must be capable of performing the duties with or without a reasonable accommodation. The Department of Veterans' Affairs is explicit about the limit: the preference applies only when qualified veteran applicants exist, and an agency has no obligation to interview a veteran if no veteran meets the position requirements. Eligibility is drawn to honorably discharged members of the Armed Forces who receive employment preference from the federal government, which imports the federal preference-eligible categories rather than defining a state test. Two related provisions do exist in statute and are sometimes mistaken for a preference. Section 8-11-120 requires state agencies to post notice of job vacancies, and Section 8-11-200 allows reimbursement of interview travel expenses on a formal agency determination. Neither is veteran-specific. Federal employment is a different system entirely. The five-point and ten-point preferences, including the ten-point compensable disability categories at ten to twenty-nine percent and at thirty percent and above, and the derived preference for a spouse, surviving spouse or mother, are federal law administered by the Office of Personnel Management and apply to federal jobs in South Carolina exactly as they do anywhere else. They have nothing to do with state hiring.