Senator Tim Scott is not on only the only black Republican member of Congress, he’s the only black member of the U.S. Senate of either party.
However, organizers of the March on Washington to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr’s. famous “I Have a Dream” speech declined to invite the unabashedly pro-life lawmakers to participate.
Noticeably absent from the speaker line-up at the Let Freedom Ring event commemorating the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington today: the nation’s only black Senator, Tim Scott.
Scott, a Republican Representative appointed by S.C. Governor Nikki Haley earlier this year to fill former Sen. Jim DeMint’s seat in the U.S. Senate after he retired, was not invited to participate in the historic event, a spokesperson for the Senator confirmed to Red Alert Politics in an email.
African-American leaders who did receive an invitation to speak at included Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.) – who participated in the original March – Martin Luther King III, MSNBC host Al Sharpton and movie stars Jamie Foxx, Oprah Winfrey and Forest Whitaker.
Scott is a staunch pro-life advocate who has a 100 percent pro-life voting record with the National Right to Life Committee. Last year, Scott voted to stop abortion funding in Obamacare, de-Fund the Planned Parenthood abortion business, and stop taxpayer funding of abortion in various instances. He voted for a ban on sex-selection abortions, for enforcing parental notification laws, to repeal Obamacare, and to ban abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy in the District of Columbia.
On 10 votes in the House, Scott voted pro-life each time.
In 2010, then candidate Tim Scott outlined the development of his political positions and party allegiance to The Weekly Standard, which wrote: “As he tells it, Scott became a Republican in three stages. First, there was the military influence… Second, there was his becoming a Christian in college. That turned him into a social conservative and strong foe of legalized abortion. This, too, turned him toward Republicans, he says.”
The New York Times provided a profile of Scott:
Scott offers a unique story and background, one that is in scant supply in the Republican party right now. Raised by a single mother, he was, by his account, a lost child who struggled with school and with life until a Chick-fil-A franchise owner took him on as a protégé and schooled him in conservative principles.
“Coming from a single-parent household and almost flunking out of high school,” Mr. Scott said in 2010, during his bid for the House, “my hope is I will take that experience and help people bring out the best that they can be.”
Although Republicans by a large margin have far fewer minorities and women in Congress than Democrats, the party, with Monday’s announcement, will now be able to claim the only current African-American member of the Senate, as well as two of the three Latinos.
