The statistical properties of semiflexible polyelectrolytes at the isotropic-nematic phase transition are studied by including the twisting term originating from the electrostatic interaction between polymer segments in the free energy. Since the twisting effect is very small, we perform a perturbation calculation that can be used to determine the linear corrections to the isotropic and nematic densities at the phase transition. We also estimate the higher-order corrections using a numerical approach.