By Laura Harris
lharris@abcnews4.com
CHARLESTON, SC (WCIV) -- He walked into the room just a tad late for our interview. The appointment before ours ran a bit over. U.S. Congressman Tim Scott has a very busy schedule to keep.
Living in both Charleston and Washington, D.C., the freshman member of Congress says he had to learn what balance is. He says he spends plenty of time making sure that he is effectively and efficiently doing his job in Washington, but not forgetting that it's here in the Lowcountry he must do his greatest works.
He admits his top priority is to serve the people and be sure that their concerns are brought back to the nation's capitol.
"We have to change the conversation in this nation, and we have to restore hope and create opportunities," Scott said. "We do that by what we do at home, not by the stuff we do in D.C."
Scott grew up in North Charleston. As a child he played on dirt roads. He says he never saw himself, then, getting this far. Scott has not only held a position of power on the county council, but he has also showed drive in his reach to parlay that council seat into a space in the U.S. Congress. He describes it as a blessing. It's a feat he is proud of.
"Thirty-six months ago I was still on county council, so yea, it still feels amazing," he said. "But really even more amazing is what we do as a community, rather than what I have done as an individual."
Scott says his success is due to the people of Charleston that believed in him when he barely graduated from Stall High School. Those are the people, he said, that voted for him and trusted he could do a good job representing them at the next level; the people that watch him everyday and say, "that's my congressman."
He says the support from those people is his real success story.
In that respect, not only has he "made it" in some way, but his community and supporters have made it as well.
But not everyone is pleased with the first-year congressman, especially when it comes to his open views about President Obama.
"I think President Obama has not done a passing job," Rep. Scott said with a stern look and a piercing eye. "I think he's sincere, but sincerely wrong, headed in the wrong direction. But I respect the fact that he wants more for his children than we have seen in our lifetime."
Comments like that raise eyebrows when it comes to Scott, an African-American Republican. He's been met with plenty of opposition, very apparent in an experience he recently had in Charleston.
"You know I was somewhere and a group of young ladies, African-American ladies, approached me and they were upset that I didn't go to the State of the Union Address," Scott said.
With a bit of a smirk on his face, he said he told them, "I went to the State of the Union address."
The group didn't believe him.
"No you didn't, we saw on the news you didn't go," one woman responded.
Rep. Scott says it was at that moment he just had to tell her, "Well I don't know what you saw on the news, but I know where I was."
There was a quick rebuttal from the woman, "Well I respect you but I don't like you that much."
Just as quick came back Rep. Scott, "And I'm ok with you not liking me as a matter of fact, because you have the right to be wrong. I'm ok with that."
He says 10 minutes later she chuckled a bit and told him he was "ok." She made it clear that she still didn't like him, but that he was "ok."
As he laughed through the story he told, he couldn't hide a bit of pride. It wasn't arrogance, just a sense of pride. Party affiliation aside, he was able to keep it simple, keep his calm, and know that at the end of the day, he was still Representative Tim Scott -- knowing he still had to go back to Washington and still had to work for the people of his district -- whether that woman liked him or not.
Rep. Scott's party affiliation always seems to be up for debate, but not up for discussion.
"There's no doubt, being an African-American, do people in the news and in schools see me as an African-American leader and try to find a way to create a wedge at times? Certainly. I'm more interested in where we're going than where we've been and who you think I am," he said. "You don't even know me."
"I'm not pro-black, I'm pro-America."
In his first term, Mr. Scott says he's helped pass 27 job-creating bills in Congress, pushed to lower the overall tax burden and ultimately feels he has made his community proud.
That said, in the words of Tim Scott, "The numbers don't lie."
Rep. Tim Scott (Joe ONeill/WCIV)
