Senator Tim Scott, the lone Black Republican in the upper house, recently announced that he will run for president in the Republican primary next year.
According to a statement of candidacy Mr. Scott submitted on Friday to the Federal Election Commission, his official campaign committee is called “Tim Scott for America,” and it has its headquarters in Charleston, the capital of the Palmetto State.
Since 2013, Mr. Scott has held the position of South Carolina’s junior senator. One of his rivals in the 2016 presidential election, Nikki Haley, appointed Mr. Scott to the Senate at that time. Jim DeMint’s resignation from the Senate to head the conservative think tank Heritage Foundation left a vacancy, which was filled by him.
Since Massachusetts Senator Edward Brooke departed the body in 1979, Mr. Scott is the first Black Republican and the first Black senator to represent a state that was a part of the Confederacy during the American Civil War.
The then-freshman Republican senator easily won reelection in 2016 and 2022 with at least 60% of the vote in each election, keeping the seat he had been assigned to in a special election in 2014.
He has always been regarded as a rising star within the Republican Party, and in 2021, he will have the honor of addressing Congress in response to President Joe Biden’s inaugural address.
Mr. Scott joins a GOP primary field that includes Ms. Haley, former President Donald Trump, ex-Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson, and billionaire Vivek Ramaswamy. His campaign website has teased a “special announcement” for May 22.
In the next days, former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis are both anticipated to formally join the Republican presidential field.
