Tim Scott could become a top candidate — just not yet
Tim Scott’s apparent presidential ambitions have received much attention lately, and for good reason: The South Carolina senator’s profile suggests he could become a top Republican presidential contender. Just not this political cycle.
Scott would start a 2024 primary race with serious challenges. He trails virtually every other contender in early national polls, scoring only 1 percent in the most recent RealClearPolitics polling average. As The Post’s David Byler recently pointed out, Scott is also the least well-known among Republicans of all the potential serious candidates. The GOP has not nominated someone with such low national recognition since 1940, when party bosses handed the nomination to utility executive Wendell Willkie.
He would face another difficult obstacle even if he were to begin to gain national attention: His appeal is largely built on his positive approach to politics and his compelling personal story of escaping poverty. That happy-warrior motif served Ronald Reagan well, but the Gipper’s GOP was very different from today’s. The current Republican base tilts toward the angry and the populist, as innumerable 2022 primary contests showed. Scott could become the darling of the party’s remaining Reaganites, but that group is a minority of the party’s voters — even if it is a majority of the party’s large donors, journalists and intellectuals.
These factors do not mean Scott should not run. Party history shows that candidates such as Scott can become national figures even if they don’t win. That, not the 2024 nomination, is Scott’s real path forward.
Each Republican primary season since 1996 has featured at least one surprise breakout candidate: Steve Forbes in 1996; John McCain in 2000; Mike Huckabee in 2008; Rick Santorum in 2012. Each languished in obscurity in polls the year before but then burst forth and became serious contenders by the early primaries. Herman Cain, Michele Bachmann and Ben Carson also had brief moments in the political sun in 2011 and 2015 before fading as the new year rang in. Scott starts this year much better-known and with much more financial and institutional support than any of these Republican candidates did.
The strategies these shooting stars deployed in their climb also augurs well for Scott. Unlike the Democratic Party, the GOP has long had clear ideological factions. Each breakout candidate effectively became the darling of one such group that the putative front-runners were not actively courting. Forbes was the choice of small-government conservatives; McCain was the favorite among moderates; the others appealed to religious and evangelical conservatives. These factions’ voters flocked to the candidate who expressed their values despite their relative obscurity.
This is where Scott’s old-style conservative optimism could serve him well. The two front-runners, former president Donald Trump and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, are both currying favor with the majority MAGA-inclined demographic. Each knows he is the favorite for the nomination if he can become that group’s first choice, and any barbs they throw at one another will likely be over issues of primary concern to those voters. That leaves the path open for someone to curry favor with the party’s old guard. Scott could be that person.
But like previous breakout stars, Scott will not be alone in that quest. Just as Forbes had to take on the nationally famous Texas Sen. Phil Gramm for leadership of the GOP’s small-government faction and Huckabee had to face Kansas Sen. Sam Brownback to become the de facto evangelical candidate, Scott will have to best former U.N. ambassador Nikki Haley as well as, potentially, former vice president Mike Pence and Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin to become the old guard’s choice. It’s possible Scott might win that contest, but it will be difficult.
Scott’s future is bright if he prevails in that intraparty warfare. He would likely become the final challenger to Trump or DeSantis, and his positive message means he would make a fine, party-unifying choice for vice president if he loses. That alone would make him a front-runner for the next open GOP contest.
But he doesn’t need to win the VP nod to stand a good chance in future cycles. Five of the party’s last seven nominees lost their first bid for the nomination. Scott is only 57 years old; he has time to make another run.
In presidential contests, many call themselves but precious few are chosen. Scott might simply be the latest in a long run of vanity candidates. But, in time, he might have a real shot at taking the Oval Office.
Henry Olsen is a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center and the Thomas W. Smith distinguished scholar in residence at Arizona State University for the winter/spring 2023 semester.