On Monday, GOP Senator Tim Scott formally joined the 2024 presidential race during an event at Charleston Southern University, with thousands in attendance.
To kick off his announcement, Scott brought his mother on stage, whom he lovingly referred to as his “favorite American,” and told the story of how he rose from poverty to being a U.S. Senator.
“Mom, I love you,” he said as he handed her flowers. “For those of you who wonder if it’s possible for a broken kid from a broken home to rise above those circumstances, the answer is yes.”
“We live in the land where it is absolutely possible for a kid raised in poverty by a single mother in a single bedroom small apartment to one day serve in the People’s House and maybe even the White House,” Scott continued.
And then the moment his supporters were waiting for, “I’m announcing today I’m running for president of the United States!”
Moments after, the audience broke out into a roar, chanting, “Tim Scott, Tim Scott, Tim Scott.”
Scott declared that he is “the candidate the far left fears the most.”
“When I cut your taxes, they called me a prop,” the senator explained. “When I re-funded the police, they called me a token. When I pushed back on President Biden, they even called me the N-word. I disrupt their narrative. I threaten their control. The truth of my life disproves their lies. I will proclaim these truths from the highest mountaintop and I will do so from the deepest valley. I will take our message to the boardroom and I will take it to the classroom. I will take it to a gymnasium filled with friends and the inner-city church surrounded by skeptics. I have lived the American dream. I have held the truth, the inalienable truth, that all men and women are created equal. And endowed by our Creator with the right to be free. Our party and our nation are standing at a time for choosing. Victimhood or victory? Grievance or greatness? I choose freedom and hope and opportunity.”
MIC-DROP!
Senator Tim Scott has officially announced his 2024 presidential run.pic.twitter.com/XcNgXDbeJV
— ALX 🇺🇸 (@alx) May 22, 2023
In 2021, Scott said during a joint session of Congress, “I remember, every morning, at the kitchen table, my grandfather would have the newspaper in his hands,” he continued. “Later, I realized he had never learned to read it. He just wanted to set the right example. I’ve also experienced a different kind of intolerance. I get called ‘Uncle Tom’ and the N-word — by ‘progressives’! By liberals! Just last week, a national newspaper suggested my family’s poverty was actually privilege… because a relative owned land generations before my time.”
He added later in the address, “Hear me clearly: America is not a racist country.”
Scott referenced back to that 2021 congressional speech during his White House bid announcement, “I will be the President who destroys the liberal lie that our country is evil.”
He said, “Two years ago I spoke to the nation and said America is not a racist country. We need to stop canceling our Founding Fathers and start celebrating them. Finally — my grandfather’s stubborn faith was not just faith in the goodness of our nation. It was faith in the goodness of our God Himself. I will be the President who stops the far left’s assault on our religious liberty. I will preserve one nation, Under God, indivisible — where we honor our Creator and respect every innocent life.”
“On my first day as Commander-in-Chief, the strongest nation on Earth will stop retreating from our own southern border,” the candidate declared. “If you don’t control your back door, it’s not your house. And if our southern border is unsafe and insecure, it’s not our country. Hundreds of people on the terrorist watch list are crossing our borders. Chinese nationals are flooding into Mexico to break in. Joe Biden and Kamala Harris are doing nothing while 70,000-plus Americans lose their lives to fentanyl. Every county in this nation is a border county. The Left shut down your schools and churches in the name of slowing down a virus. But they won’t secure the border to protect your family from fentanyl. When I am President, the drug cartels using Chinese labs and Mexican factories to kill Americans will cease to exist. I will freeze their assets. I’ll build the wall. And I will let the world’s greatest military fight these terrorists — because that’s exactly what they are.”
When it comes to China, Scott called the competition between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party exactly what it is: a new Cold War.
“It’s about our supply chains. It’s about medicines, microchips, and critical minerals,” Scott said. “It’s about China buying American farmland, infiltrating our airspace, and tracking our kids. It’s about President Xi siding with Putin and Iran. America can win this competition. But Joe Biden can’t. As President, I will rebuild a military so lethal and powerful that our adversaries will fear us and our allies will respect us. My father — who is here with us today — and my brothers have 85 years of combined military service between them. When I am President, our servicemembers will have every tool they need, and our veterans will have every resource they deserve. We will not try to be the world’s police force. But we will always defend our vital national interests and our people. And we will win the next century by the strength of our economy. China started this new economic Cold War, but America will finish it.”
