Republican Senator Tim Scott (R-SC) is planning to endorse President Donald Trump for the 2024 GOP nomination race, according to reports.
Sen. Scott will reportedly give his endorsement during Trump’s rally in New Hampshire on Friday evening.
Scott ended his own run for the White House in November.
However, the senator will join Trump at a rally Friday evening in Concord, New Hampshire, and formally announce his support for the 45th president, sources with knowledge of the matter told Fox News.
Both Trump, who’s the commanding frontrunner in the GOP nomination race, and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley called the senator in recent days as they both tried to secure Scott’s endorsement, sources confirm.
While Scott’s presidential campaign failed to ignite, he remains very popular with Republican primary voters.
His endorsement has been heavily coveted by the remaining GOP candidates.
As Scott ended his presidential bid, he made clear that he had no immediate plans to support another candidate.
But sources in his political orbit told Fox at the time that the senator remained open to backing a candidate.
Scott’s backing of Trump, whom the senator rarely criticized on the campaign trail during his White House run, is the latest major endorsement for the former president in the state that holds the first southern primary in the GOP nomination race.
Gov. Henry McMaster and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) have long supported Trump.
The state’s February 24 Republican presidential primary is the next major contest in the Republican schedule following Tuesday’s New Hampshire primary.
The contest is winner-take-all, which means the victor in the Palmetto State will capture all 50 Republican delegates at stake.
Scott, the only black Republican in the Senate, launched his presidential campaign in May at an event in North Charleston, South Carolina.
Standing just a few miles from where he grew up, he highlighted that “we live in the land where it is possible for a kid raised in poverty by a single mother in a small apartment to one day serve in the People’s House and maybe even the White House.”
At the time, the senator said he was “stunned at the hunger for something positive as long as it’s anchored in conservatism.
“As long as you have a backbone.”
But his positive and uplifting message failed to resonate in a GOP presidential nomination race dominated by Trump.
By late autumn, Scott was struggling to qualify for the debates and his poll numbers were stuck in the single digits.
On November 12, Scott announced he was ending his White House bid during an appearance on Fox News’ “Sunday Night in America” with Trey Gowdy.
“I think the voters, who are the most remarkable people on the planet, have been really clear that they’re telling me, ‘Not now, Tim,’” Scott said.
Haley and Scott share a long political history.
They both served together in the state legislature.
In 2012, then-Gov. Haley appointed then-Rep. Scott to the Senate to fill a vacancy.
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