Late last night Tim Scott decided to join the attacks on Governor DeSantis over Florida’s curriculum when asked by reporters what he thinks of “DeSantis saying black people benefited from slavery”.
First of all let’s be clear that Governor DeSantis NEVER said that. It was Kamala Harris who claimed that Florida’s curriculum taught that black people benefited from slavery. But Tim Scott fell for it anyway:
Here’s what he said: “As a country founded upon freedom, the greatest deprivation of freedom was slavery.There is no silver lining in slavery. The truth is that anything you can learn, any benefits that people suggest you had during slavery, you would have had as a free person. Slavery was really about separating families, about mutilating humans and even about raping their wives. It was just devastating. So, I would hope that every person in our country and certainly running for president would appreciate that. Listen, people have bad days, sometimes they regret what they say, and we should ask them again to clarify their positions.”
Tim Scott either knew what he was doing or he got played by the media. I’m going to give him the benefit of the doubt and say he bought the false narrative given to him by the media because he wasn’t up on the issues. Now he looks like another weak-kneed Republican. Either way, do better Tim Scott.
Governor DeSantis was asked about what Scott said today and here’s how he responded:
DeSantis said: “I think part of the reason our country has struggled is because DC Republicans all to often accept false narratives, accept lies that are perpetrated by the left, accept the lies that Kamala Harris has been perpetrating even when that has been debunked. That’s not the way you do it. The way you do it, the way you lead is to fight back against the lies, is to speak the truth. So I’m here defending my state of Florida against false accusations and against lies and we’re going to continue to speak the truth.”
DeSantis is absolutely right. At the very least Tim Scott should have assumed what the media was telling him wasn’t true and said he’d need to verify that before responding. But he didn’t. He assumed they were telling him the truth and that tells us something about Tim Scott. He’s another DC Republican who doesn’t have the backbone needed to do what’s needed. Of course we already knew that. Just ask Alaskan Senator Lisa Murkowski.
As a bonus, look what upset the reporter who posted this interview: