FIRST ON FOX – Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina is heading next month to the state that has kicked off the presidential nominating calendar for half a century.
Scott, the only Black Republican in the Senate, will address Polk County Republican Party’s Lincoln Dinner on Feb. 22 in West Des Moines, Iowa.
This stop and others have fueled speculation about his possible White House ambitions in 2024.
Polk County, home to Des Moines, Iowa’s capital and largest city, is the most populous county in the Hawkeye State. Polk County GOP chair Gloria Mazza told Fox News she’s ‘excited’ to have the senator headline her event.
Scott, one of the Republican Party’s top fundraisers, easily cruised to re-election in November to what he’s said will be his final six-year term in the Senate.
While Scott’s repeatedly demurred when asked about 2024, he hinted in November at a possible future run during his re-election victory celebration by telling the story of how he took his grandfather to the polls in 2012, and that his grandfather proudly voted for him as well as for Democrat Barack Obama, the nation’s first Black president.
‘I wish he had lived long enough to see perhaps another man of color elected president of the United States,’ Scott said, before adding ‘but this time let it be a Republican.’
Scott made three stops in Iowa last year to help fundraise and campaign for Republicans running in the 2022 midterm elections. He also made a couple of stops the past two years in New Hampshire, which for a century has held the first primary in the White House race and directly follows Iowa in the GOP presidential nominating calendar.
South Carolina, Scott’s home state, holds the third contest in Republican presidential nominating schedule.