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    5 Takeaways From Ron DeSantis’s First Campaign Trip

    He swung back at Donald Trump. He vowed to vanquish the “woke mob” and turn the country into mega-Florida. He had normal encounters with voters that didn’t become memes.After his unusual, buzzy and ill-fated presidential debut on Twitter last week, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida carried out a far more traditional campaign tour this week, barnstorming Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina to sell himself as the strongest Republican alternative to former President Donald J. Trump.Along the way, he drew sizable, enthusiastic crowds of DeSantis-curious voters. He held babies. He got testy with a reporter. He threw some punches at Mr. Trump. He warned of a “malignant ideology” being pressed by liberals and vowed to “impose our will” to stop it.Here are five takeaways.He won’t cower against Trump — but how hard he’ll counterattack is unclear.For months, Mr. DeSantis held his fire against Mr. Trump. Those days are clearly over.“Petty,” he labeled Mr. Trump’s taunts. “Juvenile.” The former president’s criticisms of him? “Bizarre” and “ridiculous.”But Mr. DeSantis made those remarks not from the stage, in front of Republican voters, but behind the scenes in comments to reporters, suggesting that he is not quite ready to attack Mr. Trump head-on. Instead, his most direct shots were saved for President Biden (“We’re going to take all that Biden nonsense and rip it out by the roots”). When it comes to Mr. Trump, the governor has said he is simply defending himself from a man with whom he avoided public disagreements for years.“Well, now he’s attacking me,” a seemingly aggrieved Mr. DeSantis said outside Des Moines.There are risks to bashing Mr. Trump. For some voters, part of Mr. DeSantis’s appeal has been his willingness to avoid warring with a fellow Republican.“DeSantis has Trump policies, without all the name-calling,” said Monica Schieb, an Iowa voter who supported Mr. Trump in 2016 but now plans to back Mr. DeSantis.Mr. DeSantis drew healthy crowds on the trip, as he did in Gilbert. He often sought to highlight his relative youthfulness at age 44, in contrast to Donald J. Trump and President Biden. Nicole Craine for The New York TimesA key message: He’s young and energetic and can serve two terms.Mr. DeSantis packed his schedule with three or four rallies per day, covering hundreds of miles in each state and addressing a total of more than 7,000 people, his campaign said.The events did not quite have the MAGA-Woodstock energy of Mr. Trump’s arena rallies, but they were lively and well-attended. Tightly orchestrated, too: There was no chowing of hoagies or cozying up to bikers at diners. Up-tempo country music and occasionally cheesy rock (“Chicken Fried” by the Zac Brown Band and “Eye of the Tiger” by Survivor) preceded him onstage.The message behind the rigorous schedule?Turning the country into a mega-Florida takes a “disciplined, energetic president,” in his words.It’s a phrase we’re likely to hear more of, given that it takes aim at both of the major obstacles in Mr. DeSantis’s path to the White House: Mr. Trump and President Biden.At nearly every event, Mr. DeSantis, 44, used comments about his energy level as an indirect swipe at his much older opponents. Mr. Trump is 76; Mr. Biden is 80. And Mr. DeSantis regularly noted that unlike his main Republican rival, Mr. Trump, he would be able to serve two terms.The messaging allowed Mr. DeSantis to set a clear contrast with the former president without necessarily angering Mr. Trump’s loyal supporters.Two terms, the governor says, would give him more time to appoint conservative Supreme Court justices and unwind the “deep state.” (Mr. Trump responded angrily to the new line of attack, saying in Iowa on Thursday that “you don’t need eight years, you need six months,” adding, “Who the hell wants to wait eight years?”)The case Mr. DeSantis is making, however, sometimes seems to be undercut by his own delivery. Even supporters acknowledge that he is not a natural orator, and on the stump he sometimes calls himself an “energetic executive” in a neutral monotone.Mr. DeSantis kicked off the tour with an event on Tuesday at an evangelical church in Clive, Iowa. Rachel Mummey for The New York TimesHumbly, he compares himself to Churchill, fighting ‘the woke mob’ on the beaches.If Mr. DeSantis had to summarize what he believes is wrong with America in one word, his three-state tour suggests the answer might be “woke,” a term that many Republican politicians find easy to use but hard to define. The governor frequently rails against “wokeness,” which he describes as a “war on the truth,” in distinctly martial terms.At several events, Mr. DeSantis, a military veteran, seemed to borrow from Winston Churchill’s famous “We shall fight on the beaches” speech, given to exhort the citizens of Britain in their existential struggle against Nazi Germany.“We will fight the woke in education,” Mr. DeSantis said in New Hampshire. “We will fight the woke in corporations. And we will fight the woke in the halls of Congress. We will never surrender to the woke mob.”(Mr. Trump seemed to take a shot at his rival’s use of the word, saying on Thursday, “I don’t like the term ‘woke,’ because I hear ‘woke, woke, woke.’” He added: “It’s just a term they use. Half the people can’t even define it. They don’t know what it is.”)Earlier, at his kickoff rally outside Des Moines on Tuesday night, Mr. DeSantis seemed to put the various building blocks of his stump speech together into a coherent vision, one that portrayed the United States as a nation being assaulted from the inside by unseen liberal forces bent on reshaping every aspect of American life.“They are imposing their agenda on us, via the federal government, via corporate America, via our own education system,” he said. “All for their benefit and all to our detriment.”In turn, Mr. DeSantis promised to aggressively wield the power of the presidency in order to resculpt the nation according to conservative principles, much as he says he has done in Florida, where he has often pushed the boundaries of executive office.“It does not have to be this way,” he continued in his Iowa kickoff speech. “We must choose a path that will lead to a revival of American greatness.” The line drew cheers.Mr. DeSantis on Thursday in Manchester, N.H. Apart from a few contentious exchanges with reporters, he avoided awkward moments on the trip. David Degner for The New York TimesHis interactions: Pretty normal, overall.Both detractors and supporters were watching closely for how Mr. DeSantis, who sometimes appears uncomfortable with the basics of retail politics, interacted with voters. Democrats and Trump allies have made a legion of memes out of his uncomfortable facial expressions or clumsy responses to voters in casual conversations. (An emphatic “OK!” is often his answer to learning a person’s name or a child’s age.)But apart from a pugnacious exchange or two with the news media — episodes that are, of course, cheered by the Republican base — Mr. DeSantis avoided obvious awkward moments. He tried to make himself relatable, playing up his dad credentials. He told stories about taking his family out for fast food and contending with a 3-year-old who needed to use the “little potty.”After his speeches, he worked the rope line, talked with voters, snapped pictures and signed autographs. He always reacted enthusiastically when voters told him they lived part-time in Florida. “What part?” was his standard follow-up, before discussing how badly those areas had been hit by Hurricane Ian.While this all might be a low bar, it was set, in part, by Mr. Trump’s relentless mockery of Mr. DeSantis’s personality.Frank Ehrenberger, 73, a retired engineer who attended a DeSantis event in Iowa on Wednesday, said the governor had struck him as “genuine.”Still, Mr. DeSantis may need to do more. At events in Iowa and New Hampshire on Wednesday and Thursday, he did not take audience questions from the stage, leading to some criticism. Instead, at one stop in New Hampshire, Mr. DeSantis tossed baseball caps to the crowd.The early nominating states require a set of political skills different from the one that works in Florida, where politicians rely heavily on television advertising to get their messages across.By Friday, during his visit to South Carolina, he had seemed to shift his strategy, electing to answer voters’ questions from the stage alongside his wife, Casey DeSantis.Casey DeSantis has given remarks in the middle of Mr. DeSantis’s stump speeches at events, talking about both their family life and what she casts as her husband’s ability to clean up “the swamp” in Washington.Nicole Craine for The New York TimesYou’ll be seeing a lot more of Casey DeSantis.At his events, Mr. DeSantis has paused his stump speech to invite Ms. DeSantis onto the stage to deliver her own remarks. As she speaks, he usually stands smiling behind her before returning to the lectern to close out his speech. At one stop in New Hampshire, he kissed her temple after she had finished.These intermissions — not unprecedented, but unusual as a routine at presidential campaign events — underscore the high-profile role Ms. DeSantis is expected to play her in husband’s bid, after acting as an important adviser in his political rise.If this first tour is anything to go by, she is likely to be one of the most prominent and politically active spouses of a major presidential candidate in several election cycles, perhaps since Bill Clinton in 2008.Onstage, Ms. DeSantis tells the usual marital stories meant to humanize candidates and illustrate their family life — including an oft-repeated bit about the time one of their three children wielded permanent markers to decorate the dining room table in the governor’s mansion.But she is far from light entertainment. Much of her roughly five-minute speech is meant to portray her husband, whom she often refers to as “the governor,” as an authoritative, decisive leader, one capable of cleaning up “the swamp” in Washington.“Through all of the history, all the attacks from the corporate media and the left, he never changes,” Ms. DeSantis said Thursday in New Hampshire. “He never backs down, he never cowers. He never takes the path of least resistance.”Ann Klein More

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    Nikki Haley’s Husband Will Deploy to Africa for Year With National Guard

    Michael Haley, a major in the South Carolina Army National Guard, served in Afghanistan in 2013.The husband of Nikki Haley, the Republican presidential candidate and former governor of South Carolina, is preparing to deploy to Africa with the Army National Guard, a military tour that is expected to last a year and for most of the G.O.P. primary race.The deployment of Michael Haley, a major in the National Guard, was confirmed on Friday by a person familiar with his plans. The person asked not to be identified because they were not authorized to speak publicly about the matter.The deployment, his second in an active-duty role overseas, was first reported by The Associated Press.It will overlap with much of the Republican nominating competition, which has picked up speed in recent weeks as more candidates join the field. The first contests are scheduled for early next year.“Our family, like every military family, is ready to make personal sacrifices when our loved one answers the call,” Ms. Haley said in a statement on Friday. “We could not be prouder of Michael and his military brothers and sisters. Their commitment to protecting our freedom is a reminder of how blessed we are to live in America.”In 2013, Major Haley deployed to Afghanistan’s Helmand Province with the South Carolina Army National Guard, which he joined in 2006. When the National Guard put out a call this spring for officers to go to Africa, he stepped forward, the person familiar with his plans said, without specifying which country or countries in Africa.Since entering the presidential race in February, Ms. Haley has significantly trailed behind former President Donald J. Trump in polling, including in South Carolina, an early primary state.Ms. Haley, who was an ambassador to the United Nations under Mr. Trump, has emphasized her foreign policy credentials and experience as South Carolina’s governor.In a break with Mr. Trump and Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, another rival for the nomination, Ms. Haley has defended American involvement in the war in Ukraine. Both Mr. Trump and Mr. DeSantis have been critical of it. More

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    Will Republicans get behind Tim Scott? – podcast

    Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina formally launched his presidential campaign on Monday, throwing his hat into the Republican ring.
    Scott leans heavily into his Christian identity and has vowed to sign legislation if he becomes president that would endear himself to conservatives, but his chances of success appear slim. Yet he’s decided to present a more optimistic view of the US in his campaign – an opposing tactic to most Republicans, including his main challenger … Donald Trump.
    This week Jonathan Freedland speaks to political historian Leah Wright Rigueur and politics reporter for The State Joseph Bustos about Scott’s chances of rallying the Republican base

    How to listen to podcasts: everything you need to know More

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    ‘Americans Like a Happy Warrior’: Our Columnists Weigh In on Tim Scott

    As Republican candidates enter the 2024 presidential race, Times columnists, Opinion writers and others will assess their strengths and weaknesses with a scorecard. We rate the candidates on a scale of 1 to 10: 1 means the candidate will probably drop out before any caucus or primary voting; 10 means the candidate has a very strong chance of receiving the party’s nomination next summer. This entry assesses Tim Scott, the junior senator from South Carolina, who announced his candidacy for the Republican nomination on Monday.How seriously should we take Tim Scott’s candidacy?Jamelle Bouie The odds that Tim Scott leaves the single digits, much less overtakes Donald Trump, are extremely slim, but I still think we should take Scott’s candidacy seriously for what it might say about the Republican Party after Trump.Jane Coaston We should take it far more seriously than we ultimately will.Michelle Cottle Maybe divide Ron DeSantis’s chances by Nikki Haley’s, then multiply by the square root of Vivek Ramaswamy’s.Ross Douthat The only reason to take Scott more seriously than his fellow South Carolinian Nikki Haley is that he has less of a national identity and brand, so there’s a little more room for him to surprise us on the campaign trail. For now, though, he occupies roughly the same terrain that she does: the donor-friendly, telegenic candidate of the multiracial future who just doesn’t have the populist edge required to satisfy the typical conservative voter’s far grimmer and more combative mood.Rosie Gray Like the other non-Trump Republicans entering the race, the odds are stacked against him. However, he’s already proved to be attractive to major G.O.P. donors and is popular in the Senate (not that that helped other Republicans much in 2016).Michelle Goldberg He’s a long shot, but we should take him more seriously than any of Trump’s other declared challengers. He’s beloved by the conservative elite, has a reported $22 million in the bank and would probably be the most formidable Republican in a general election.Liz Mair He’s unlikely to be the G.O.P. presidential nominee — but very likely to be the vice-presidential nominee.Daniel McCarthy Tim Scott is the most serious candidate who isn’t Trump or Ron DeSantis. That may seem like faint praise. But Republican primary voters have been eager to consider Black candidates in recent cycles: Herman Cain in 2012, Ben Carson in 2016. That eagerness gives Scott an opening.Alex Stroman Tim Scott is a serious candidate with a biography that in any other year would make him one of the likeliest nominees for the presidency. A strong finish in Iowa — a state tailor-made for a candidate like Scott — could still propel him to the nomination.What matters most about him as a presidential candidate?Bouie In terms of his assets as a candidate, he is one of the most prodigious and impressive fund-raisers in the Republican Party, which is a testament to his serious retail political skill. But what truly matters most is the fact that he’s trying to build on the things Trump brought to Republican politics while also trying to forge a different direction for the party.Coaston He is a candidate with both a self-concept and a policy direction. He is very conservative, but his conservatism is rooted in conservative policy, not just conservative performance. His police reform bill favored oversight rather than reducing protections for police in civil cases, for example. That’s not my ideal, but it’s one that I understand, at least.Cottle As the lone Black Republican in the Senate, he is an experienced elected leader who could help soften the party’s image as a bunch of angry, racist old white guys.Douthat From his perspective, what matters most is whether Ron DeSantis collapses and there’s a scramble to find a different anti-Trump candidate — or somewhat more plausibly, whether he can sell himself as a compelling vice-presidential candidate for the eventual nominee. From the country’s perspective, he and Haley and Vivek Ramaswamy are all reminders that the G.O.P. is, in its own way, a multiethnic big tent — but not in the kind of way that’s likely to make Scott its nominee.Gray For one thing, Scott’s run is historic in that he is the first Black officeholder to seek the Republican presidential nomination, as Jamelle Bouie recently pointed out. And his candidacy, like that of Haley, will be a test of how much support truly exists for the favorites of the old G.O.P. establishment.Goldberg White people on the right love Black conservatives who mostly absolve them on racial issues while indicting progressives. Mair Scott’s entire persona and approach runs counter to what is currently dominant in the Republican Party. He’s a very positive, optimistic and upbeat guy. You don’t find that often in today’s politics — in either party. He’s also smart and a very strong communicator, even when explaining complex policy.McCarthy His candidacy makes it harder to overlook Black men who support the G.O.P. In Scott, they have an example of success within the party. Nearly one in five Black men nationwide voted for Donald Trump in 2020 — Senator Scott would broaden the national conversation as well as the Republican field.Stroman He’s inspiring and doesn’t turn off moderates or MAGA supporters. He’s a conservative, but he’s not angry about it — a refreshing outlier when both parties are dominated by loud voices playing to their bases and ignoring the middle. If his major addresses (his 2020 Republican National Convention speech and 2021 response to President Biden’s first address to Congress) are anything like his campaign, I expect he will run a compassionate-conservative-style race that focuses on uplifting and uniting the country and making Americans feel proud again.What do you find most inspiring — or unsettling — about his vision for America?Bouie I think he, along with his fellow South Carolinian Nikki Haley, represents one vision for a multiracial ideological conservatism that might have legs.Coaston He sounds like a person who exists outside of Washington, in comparison to his party, which talks a lot about the evils of the Beltway while never leaving. Today, who is a Republican and who is a Democrat is shifting. No better example of that than Tim Scott.Cottle He’s aiming for a unity and optimism vibe — more “morning in America” than “American carnage.”Douthat Scott looks like the heir to Jack Kemp’s old blueprint for how the Republican Party could thrive in a multiracial future — with an upbeat, equal-opportunity, colorblind-capitalism-lifts-all-boats vision of the American experiment. This vision was too simplistic in Kemp’s era and way too simplistic now; it is, however, a piece of what a healthy conservatism should offer to the country.Gray Scott markets himself as a positive, optimistic, let’s-work-together guy, but his politics are in line with the most intransigent conservatives of his party. Whether this is inspiring or unsettling I guess depends on one’s point of view.Goldberg He’s a sunny and optimistic figure, not an apocalyptic culture warrior, and has a record of bipartisan work on criminal justice reform. I’d be very sad if Scott became president, but I wouldn’t be terrified.Mair Scott’s personal story really exemplifies why he believes what he believes about limited government and small-c conservatism, and why it will open up opportunities for many Americans who have historically lacked them. And Scott himself is an inspiring guy.McCarthy What’s most inspiring about Senator Scott’s vision is its integration of certain sound priorities old and new: stronger border enforcement, including building the wall that Trump proposed in 2016, combined with unsexy but urgent traditional G.O.P. themes like curbing the national debt. Scott is no national conservative, but he has learned some lessons from populism without forgetting what was right about older fiscal orthodoxies.Stroman He didn’t go to Fordham or to an Ivy League school — he went to Charleston Southern, a small Southern Baptist university near his hometown, North Charleston, where he announced his presidential campaign. He was raised by a single mother in poverty, and became only the seventh Black U.S. senator in American history. Through his story, Scott has the ability to attract new voters to the party — if primary voters will give him the opportunity.Imagine you’re a G.O.P. operative or campaign manager. What’s your elevator pitch for a Scott candidacy?Bouie Americans like a happy warrior, and Scott is nothing if not a happy warrior.Coaston He speaks to an optimistic conservatism — one that believes in its own rhetoric.Cottle He has a great back story, and he’d make a heckuva V.P. candidate.Douthat If the Republican Party could just seem normal, friendly and nonapocalyptic for more than five minutes at a time, it could beat Joe Biden by five points. Why not nominate Scott and try it?Gray Scott has a compelling story and a more positive message than mudslinging rivals like Trump and DeSantis. He could be attractive to voters who are sick of the back-and-forth and want a more hopeful-seeming alternative.Goldberg At a time when the Democratic Party is losing Black men, a Tim Scott nomination would be a nightmare for Joe Biden.Mair Tim Scott offers sunny optimism for a great country whose best days really are ahead of it.McCarthy Tim Scott is the Republican answer to the 1619 Project.Stroman Trump has to win Iowa. But evangelicals win Iowa, and Tim Scott is an evangelical.Jane Coaston (@janecoaston) is a staff writer in Opinion.Michelle Cottle (@mcottle) is a member of The Times’s editorial board.Rosie Gray (@RosieGray) is a political reporter.Jamelle Bouie, Ross Douthat and Michelle Goldberg are Times columnists.Liz Mair (@LizMair) has served as a campaign strategist for Scott Walker, Roy Blunt, Rand Paul, Carly Fiorina and Rick Perry. She is the founder and president of Mair Strategies.Daniel McCarthy (@ToryAnarchist) is the editor of Modern Age: A Conservative Review.Alex Stroman (@AlexStroman) is a former spokesman with the Republican National Committee and executive director of the South Carolina Republican Party.The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram. More

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    Tim Scott: 10 things to know about the Republican entering the 2024 race

    Tim Scott, a senator from South Carolina, formally announced his candidacy in the race for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination. One of an increasing number of nominees joining a fight that will include heavyweights Donald Trump and Ron DeSantis, the South Carolina senator has risen quickly over the past decade to a position of prominence in the GOP.Here are 10 things to know about Tim Scott.Scott is a 57-year-old senator from South CarolinaScott grew up in South Carolina, attending a Baptist university and owning an insurance company before becoming involved in politics. He entered politics in the mid-1990s as a Charleston, South Carolina, city council member before running for Congress.Scott leans into a story of personal success and ‘personal responsibility’Scott presents himself as an American success story. After growing up in poverty, living with his single mother in his grandparents’ house, Scott says he was mentored by a local Chick-fil-A business owner who taught him “conservative business principles” and allowed him to see a way to a better life. He has described his life as an “only in America” story of achievement, and claimed that people need to take “individual responsibility” for their lives.Scott was first elected to Congress in 2010Scott staked his political claim amid a wave of conservative opposition to Barack Obama’s presidency. As a member of the hardline conservative Tea Party movement, he was endorsed at the time by the former Alaska governor Sarah Palin and became a rising star of the party. After two years as a congressman, he was chosen in 2012 to replace the Republican senator Jim DeMint and appointed to the Senate.Scott is the sole Black Republican senatorScott is the only Black Republican senator, and was the first Black Republican elected to the US House of Representatives from South Carolina in over a hundred years. He has previously talked about his unique role as a Black Republican and the discrimination he has faced from authorities, but has claimed that liberals use race as a way to divide voters. He faced heated criticism from Black activists in 2021 after declaring “America is not a racist country” in response to a speech from President Joe Biden that condemned racism following a white supremacist mass shooting.Scott repeatedly emphasizes his evangelical faithScott’s campaign is set to heavily court evangelical voters and lean into his conservative Christian identity – Scott has previously said he sees himself first as a biblical leader rather than a Republican or conservative. In a video declaring he was launching an exploratory committee for president, Scott said that he would “defend the Judeo-Christian foundation our nation is built on” and the committee’s first fundraising email included a call for a two-minute prayer in support of Scott.Scott has vowed to sign anti-abortion legislation if presidentScott told NBC News reporters in April that he would sign “the most conservative, pro-life legislation that they can get through Congress” if elected president. Although Scott did not give a specific answer on how far into a pregnancy he would make abortion illegal, he did not rule out a six-week federal ban when asked to clarify his stance.‘He is the exact opposite of Donald Trump’Scott’s reputation is that of a “kind-hearted” and optimistic politician, Republican pollster Frank Luntz told the Guardian. It’s a stark difference in tone from Trump, whose apocalyptic vision of the United States and vows of retribution against his opponents have come to dominate the GOP.But Scott has praised Trump and advocated similar policiesWhen the Fox News host Sean Hannity asked Scott in February what the differences would be between his platform and Trump’s, the senator responded “probably not very many at all”. He called the policies passed under Trump’s presidencies “monumental” and said he was “so thankful” that Trump was elected.Some Republican mega-donors have backed Scott’s campaignWealthy conservative mega-donors are throwing some of their largesse in Scott’s direction, with the tech billionaire Larry Ellison giving $15m to a pro-Scott SuperPac. Scott’s campaign told reporters in May that it had about $22m cash on hand.Scott’s support from Republican voters appears very lowA recent Morning Consult poll from 16 May showed Scott with only 1% of Republican primary voters supporting him. In contrast, that same poll placed Trump with 61% support among the same group. More

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    Tim Scott’s mic fails as he launches 2024 presidential campaign – video

    Tim Scott was announcing his presidential campaign on Monday, when a technical glitch left the 57-year-old senator in silence. ‘Joe Biden and the radical left are attacking every rung of the ladder that helped me climb. And that is why I am announcing today that I am running for president of the United States of America,’ Scott told a cheering crowd at Charleston Southern University in his home state of South Carolina. ‘Our nation, our values, and our people are strong, but our president is weak,’ he added. At that point, the sound cut out.
    Scott joins a growing field of Republican candidates hoping to win their party’s nomination and deprive Donald Trump of a repeat contest with Joe Biden next year More

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    Senator Tim Scott launches bid for 2024 Republican presidential nomination

    Tim Scott formally launched his presidential campaign on Monday, joining a growing field of Republican candidates looking to capture their party’s nomination and rob Donald Trump of another opportunity to face off against Joe Biden next year.“Under President Biden, our nation is retreating away from patriotism and faith,” Scott told a cheering crowd at Charleston Southern University in his home state of South Carolina. “Joe Biden and the radical left are attacking every rung of the ladder that helped me climb. And that is why I am announcing today that I am running for president of the United States of America.”As the only Black Republican serving in the US Senate, Scott argued he had a unique perspective to offer on how conservative policies can best serve the American people, and he leaned into his optimistic vision for the future of the country. Scott’s mother joined him on stage at his campaign event, and he thanked her for “standing strong in the middle of the fight”.“We live in the land where it is absolutely possible for a kid raised in poverty in a single-parent household in a small apartment to one day serve in the People’s House and maybe even the White House,” Scott said. “This is the greatest nation on God’s green Earth.”The South Carolina lawmaker was introduced by the Senate minority whip, John Thune of South Dakota, who became the highest-ranking congressional Republican to endorse Scott in the presidential race.“I want all of America to know what South Carolina knows and what I know because I get to see it every day in the United States Senate – and that is that Tim Scott is the real deal,” Thune said.Scott’s announcement came three days after his team filed official paperwork with the Federal Election Commission (FEC), confirming his plans to run for the White House. Later this week, the 57-year-old senator plans to visit the early voting states of Iowa and New Hampshire, where he has already met a number of Republican primary voters as part of his Faith in America listening tour that kicked off in February.Scott’s team will also begin airing TV ads in Iowa and New Hampshire this week as part of a $5.5m ad buy that is scheduled to run through the first Republican presidential debate in late August.Scott enters the race with a significant fundraising advantage over many of his primary opponents. After Scott won re-election to the Senate in November, his campaign committee still had $22m in cash on hand that can now be used to bolster his presidential candidacy. According to the FEC, Scott’s existing funds represent the largest sum of money that any US presidential candidate has ever had when launching a campaign.Speaking to reporters last week, senior campaign officials insisted Scott’s funds would help him break out in a primary field where he has struggled to gain national recognition. The most recent Morning Consult poll showed Scott drawing the support of just 1% of Republican primary voters across the country. Even in his home state of South Carolina, which will hold its primary after Iowa’s and New Hampshire’s contests, Scott is stuck in fourth place, according to a Winthrup University survey taken last month.The South Carolina survey showed Scott trailing behind Trump, the Florida governor, Ron DeSantis, and former UN ambassador Nikki Haley. Having served as South Carolina’s governor before joining the Trump administration, Haley also enjoys a home state advantage there, further complicating Scott’s path to victory.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionBut Scott’s campaign advisers argued the senator’s optimistic message and compelling personal story would soon resonate with a large swath of voters. Scott was raised by a single Black mother, and his grandfather dropped out of school in the third grade to start picking cotton. Scott often summarizes his life story as “from cotton to Congress in one lifetime”, a theme he emphasized in 2021, when he was tapped to deliver the Republican response to Biden’s first presidential address to a joint session of Congress.Viewed as a rising star in the Republican party, Scott played a central role in the congressional negotiations over criminal justice reform. After the murder of George Floyd in 2020, Scott worked with two Democratic lawmakers – Senator Cory Booker of New Jersey and then representative Karen Bass of California – to try to craft a bipartisan compromise on policing reform, but the talks collapsed in 2021 without any agreement reached.Although Scott has attempted to work across the aisle on criminal justice issues, he remains staunchly conservative on everything from gun safety to abortion access. He received an A rating from the Gun Owners of America last year, and he enjoys a voting score of 94% from the rightwing group Heritage Action, putting him 16 points ahead of an average Senate Republican.Scott also has an A rating from the anti-abortion group Susan B Anthony Pro-Life America and has vowed to sign the “most conservative pro-life legislation” that can pass Congress if he becomes president. However, Scott has remained vague on his preferred cutoff point for banning abortion, telling NBC News last month: “I’m not going to talk about six or five or seven or 10 [weeks].”Scott will probably face more questions from voters about his policy agenda as he hits the campaign trail this week. More