Greenville. Jennifer ready, abc columbia news. On the other side of the political aisle, hes in barely. Martin omalley will be allowed into the democratic president ial debate on sunday in charleston that jen just mentioned. This despite averaging just 4. 6 in iowa. The debates host, nbc, had said in order to participate, candidates would have to average at least 5 nationally or in one of the states with an upcoming contest. Omalley barely made it thanks to the networks willingness to round up his percentage. And both clinton and sanders called on nbc to include omalley in the debate. Inside the South Carolina statehouse tonight, details are now known on a pair of bipartisan efforts to benefit state employees. This morning, some South Carolina senators announced their plan. Eric weisfeld has the details. It is indeed a great day here in South Carolina. More people are the calling the palmetto state home, more state has a Budget Surplus of 1,200 million so why have the number of state employees on the payroll gone down . Some South Carolina senators hope to reverse that trend. State employees are the backbone of state services and State Government to the people of South Carolina. They cannot be forgotten as we go forward. South carolina state employees have only received pay increases two of the last seven years. Senator john courson will tell you that due to that Budget Surplus, a proposed 5 cost of living raise wont come at the hands of taxpayers. So he says theres no better time to give back to these workers for a job well done. I think its time to thank those Public Employees and state employees to help the massive flood we had last fall and tell you thank you. Next step, well, senator courson says the house will hopefully put the proposed pay raise into their appropriations if not, he says, hell make every effort to get it in there. In the studio tonight, im eric weisfeld, abc columbia news. All right. Lets talk weather. I dont know about you. Cold is cold to me. So its a little bit warmer out there today than it has been. But i really cant tell the difference. I hope you enjoyed it and i hope everybody else enjoyed it because i think john farley is talking about some big changes for tomorrow, john . Thats right. Yeah, alicia, really, its less warm less cold, i iuess what youd say, right . Here you go. By the way, its not 46 in manning right now. Something is something is not right with that thermometer. Everybody else 50s and low 60s. Tonight is more comfortable than it has been certainly and as we go over the next several hours, what will happen here is the clouds will continue to fill in. The result will be the temperatures not dropping so far. 44 by the time were out at 11 00 and tomorrow morning, whats going to happen is well see temperatures dip down really upper 30s, even a couple off low 40s. In overnight. Now, whats going to happen tomorrow, the rain arrives a little earlier than we expected over the past couple of days here. Lets give you a look at that. Morning commute, just the latter half of it, we could see a couple of showers but things will really pick up in earnest from about mid morning right through the afternoon. Good little soaking out o o this as we go through the day tomorrow. Now, well talk about whether its out in time for your date tomorrow night and your weekend plans. Thats coming up. All right, john. Thanks. One person has been arrested in a weeken shooting. Investigators say Michael Robinson shot and killed Rodney Francis last saturday. According to police, that shooting took place outside of the restaurant rue 77 on the corner of assembly and lady streets. Investigators say the shooting stemmed from a previous argument between robinson and francis. A sumter man is accused of using his computer to share child pornography. A spokesperson for the attorney William Phillips is charged with 15 counts related to Sexual Exploitation of minors. Investigators say that phillips was involved in exchanging files containing child pornography via peer to peer file sharing. Theres now a permanent reminder of a 5monthold baby who drowned in a socastee creek. This grave stone for grace santa cruz was placed in a Conway Cemetery this week. It was paid for by neighbors who took up a collection for the marker. The childs mother is charged with homicide by child abuse. Staying on the crime beat tonight, notorious suspected jewel thief will not be getting out of jail any time soon. This afternoon, an atlanta judge denied bond for abigail kemp. Kemp is accused of robbing half a dozen jewelry storere across the southeast including one right here in South Carolina. Investigators say in most cases that she tied up store employees at gun point before stealing the jewelry and taking as much as 400,000 worth at one store. The armys largest Training BaseSergeant Major this afternoon. Sergeant major Lamont Christian takes responsibility as fort jacksons most senior enlisted officer. Previously, christian served as the commandment of the drill sergeant academy. All right. Kind of good news bad news. If you dont live in california, tennessee or florida, heres the bad news. You didnt win last nights record breaking 1. 6 billion jackpot. Might not be a billion dollars but some South Carolinaians still walked away with some prize money. And with more on that, heres abc columbias abc columbias beth rousseau. I hope you have the tickets. Good luck. A 1. 6 billion powerball drawing that dashed the dreams of all but three winners. Probably would have traveled a lot. Bought a better car. Paid off some bills. Paid off student loans. I would have given most of it away. While no South Carolinaians hit the jackpot, a Record Number of more than 366,000 Winning Tickets were sold in the state, and another 11 for 50,000. As contestants are collecting their cash, the department of Consumer Affairs is warning against scams. Like i said, this has been in the news, its one of those common scams that never goes away. Following the recordbreaking jackpot, the department is encouraging powerball players to be wary. Definitely dont want to engage with anyone who is contacting me via email or over the phone or if theyre asking for your personal information as well, that would be a red flag. Winning and losing set aside, players take comfort in knowing that 43 of the money spent on tickets i bought three tickets. 30. Bought two. Four. Is going towards education. I can definitely use some money to help me through college and i know other people could use it, too, so im glad its able to help people out. Thats where it needs to go. In columbia, beth rousseau, abc columbia news. All right. Weather story is inspiring this years indie grits festival. Find out if your Favorite Movie is up for an oscar. Abc columbia news at 6 00. British Actor Alan Rickman has british Actor Alan Rickman has died. Sources familiar with his career say that rickman had been battling cancer. Rickman was known for his roles as hans gruber in die hard and the professor in harry potter. He was 69 years old. Plans are under way for columbias annual Film Festival indie grits. This years theme is water lines which organizers say will allow the festival sxitsand its artists to document the historic flooding through the festival. The organizer of indie grits says this years event promises to be the most successful yet. We made a point to broaden the scope of the festival to include a wide range of different elements of new southern culture including crafts, theater, all kinds of different things. Like they get a big donation from the Central CarolinaCommunity Foundation as well. The indie grits festival, by the 17th. The nominations for the 2016 Academy Awards were announced this morning. Very exciting. Looks like this years big winner could be Leonardo Dicaprios the revevent with 12 nominations and mad max fury road with 10. You can find out who takes home the big honors february 28th right here on abc columbia. Big news if leonardo actually wins. Such a great actor. Up next, john with a look at the seven day forecast. Stay with us for more abc gervais. Welcome back. Thought id start you tonight with a little time lapsef the sunset and what you see out there isis a leading edge of clouds. Those clouds just embark tonight but tomorrow, there will be some bite to them. Well get rain out of thiss before we get to that, i want to talk about something really, really unusual. A hurricane in the atlantic in january. No kidding. Check this out. Were way, way out here in the atlantic. Heres the center of the storm right here. This is hurricane alex. It has sustained winds of 85 miles an hour. So its category one hurricane. And its heading due north. Now, by the way, what you cant see is the azores are right about in there. Theyll get a direct hit from a hurricane in january. This doesnt happen very often so very, very unusual. Once it goes beyond, it will kind of fizzle out as it goes north into the atlantic but a hurricane in mid january, not something that we see very often. Here you go for us back at home, heres the moisture. Down here in the gulf. Now, what will happen is its going to get tapped up in this low that will get going and the low will track basically off to our south and east. It will have a fair amount of moisture with it as well. And if youve been tracking this or ive been tracking it for the la couple of days, it looked like it was going to be an afternoon evening event and now it looks like it will be an all day event but well be out of here in time for your evening plans. If youre going out tomorrow, that will be a little bit of a bonus. Here you go. 8 00 tomorrow morning, notice the rain is just starting to get here. So maybe a couple of showers on the latter end of the commute but again, the main event. That works right on through as we go through the day. There you are 10 00 in the morning. Were all getting a good soaking. Noon, 1 is 00, 2 00, 3 00, roughly the same and then it breaks up into the Late Afternoon such that the evening commute probably a couple of but that will do it. Overnight tomorrow night, things clear out and the weekend looks fabulous. Warm saturday. A littleooler for you on sunday. Here you go tonight, clouding up. Temperatures dropping not that far. 38 for a low. Tomorrow, its just plain going to be rainy. Start to finish as i showed you, basically. Temperatures mid to upper 50s. Maybe eking out a low 60 and that would do it. Beyond that, i will show you. Weekend looks just fine. Saturday, how about mid 60s and a lot of sunshine . Thats going to be beautiful. Sunday, a few clouds. Whats going to happen on sunday coast. It will be far enough away that it will miss us. Some cooler air. That will do it. The real cold air gets in here next week. We have 40s for highs on monday and tuesday and way down to the mid 20s on monday night. Thats your weather. Thank you so much, john farley. Carolina panthers getting set for a rematch of last years playoff game with the seahawks. And dawn staley and carolina on the road tonight in an arena im mike gillespie. In three days, the panthers turning our attention to the panthers. Hi, im mike gillespie. In three days, carolina hosts the seahawks in a rematch of last years divisional playoff game. Excuse my phone there. Last year didnt go too well in seattle. In fact, out of teams, cam newton has faced at least three times in his career, the seahawks have held newton to his lowest completion percentage and yards per game in those contests against seattle. Cam newton, though, wants another shot at the seahawks. Wouldnt have wanted it any other way, you know what im saying . And thats kind of the the muststee tv, you know, you got good players on both sides of the ball with the special teams offensively, defensively onn both teams, you know, thats why you pretty much come to the league or you look and you eye matchups like this. Being in the playoffs like we have now the third year in a row, being in this situation, it should be a huge plus for us. We understand what playoff you know, we understand the tempo. We understand, you know, whats whats at stake. Lets talk basketball. Tonight, carolina trying to stay undefeated this season. But the gamecocks going to a place they havent had much success in. Thats lexington, kentucky. Carolina has only won once in lexington against the kentucky wildcats since 2009. 16 record. Staley warning earlier in the week kentucky on the road. A very difficult challenge for her team. Create what we create. They show up and they support their program. Its a rival game so, you know, its always high energy. You got to come to play. If you dont, you know, they takekedvantage of it. Carolina mens undefeated season coming to an end last night on the road in alabama. The gamecocks didnt score until held to a season low of 22 first half points. Defense couldnt stop the tide either. Now one undefeated s. M. U. It was the second best start in program history, best since 1933. Carolina hasnt started 30 in conference play since 1996. But 151, Frank Martins best start ever in his coaching career. Sticking with sketball, huge statement win wednesday night at home for clemson basketball with a 6863 win over sixth ranked duke. That was clemsons fourth win in a row and fourth win in a row over an acc opponent, no less. Clemson has backtoback wins over top 25 opponents. That game can go a long way in gaining momentum for the rest of the year. Very powerful in this sport. Its very powerful with young people. And, you know, we had some negative momentum in the beginning of the season. It just, you know, we needed a win in a close game like that to kind of keep us going in the right direction. And guys, one final note, the 49ers hire former eagles head coach chip kelly and apparently, one of the reasons why chip kelly was fired in philadelphia was because he didnt attend the Holiday Party back in december. Wow. Uhhuh. Ho ho ho i guess so. Wow. John farley with another look stay with us. No way around it. Rainy tomorrow. It starts by late commute. But it does end by the time the afternoon commute comes around. And tomorrow evening should be fine. A little breezy. But drying out. Saturday, lovely. Look at that. 65 and sunny next week it gets cold. All right. Thanks so much for watching abc. Columbia news at 6 00 and for making us your choice for local news, weather and sports stay tuned for world news tonight with david muir