Dem
51
GOP
49
That's Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC), not Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL). Politico's lead story yesterday was about how badly Scott is faltering. Not only is he polling under 2%, but now his hometown newspaper has called on him to drop out of the presidential race and support Nikki Haley. Ouch. Painful.
When your own team is against you, maybe there is a message there. The reasoning of the Post and Courier is clear. The editors are Republicans and don't think Donald Trump can beat Joe Biden, so they want some other Republican to be the GOP nominee. They don't think Scott has the right stuff. They think Nikki Haley has it. They note that she is rising in the polls, is raising plenty of money, and is willing to challenge Trump openly. She gets extra credit for her foreign policy and diplomacy expertise what with Ukraine and Israel now being high on the agenda and possibly still there on Jan. 20, 2025. The editors wrote: "Many presidential candidates have had more impressive foreign policy credentials than Ms. Haley. But the former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations leaves the rest of this year's GOP field in the dust. And she combines experience with a hawkishness that our nation needs: one that will stand up to Hamas—and to Russia and China and all the other nations and players that are coalescing into an axis of totalitarianism and anti-Americanism."
This is just the quasi-endorsement of one small paper, but given it is from Scott's hometown, surely the message will sink in that his quest for the top job is over. And de facto, so is his quest for the bucket of you-know-what. He can't be on a ticket with Haley because they are from the same state. Neither Trump nor Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) would pick him because, well, he's Black and that would alienate many of their racist supporters. He seems to be popular enough in South Carolina, where 26% of the population is Black, so he can stay in the Senate for years to come. But we expect him to drop out of the presidential race before long. He's just not viable anymore. (V)