Tim Scott Hopes to Swing Iowa Evangelical Voters With New Ad

Christian Hall
·2 min read
1
  • Oops!
    Something went wrong.
    Please try again later.
  • Oops!
    Something went wrong.
    Please try again later.
  • Oops!
    Something went wrong.
    Please try again later.

(Bloomberg) -- Tim Scott is deepening his pitch to Iowa’s Christian voters, aiming to make inroads with a bloc that will be crucial in making his 2024 Republican presidential campaign competitive in an early voting state.

Most Read from Bloomberg

Scott on Wednesday released a new ad that is part of a $6 million buy, espousing his Judeo-Christian values and casting them as a guide for the country. It’s is a direct appeal to Iowa’s heavily Christian electorate. More than 9 in 10 Iowa Republicans identify as Christian, according to Pew Research Center data.

The buy ramps up Scott’s advertising in the state. Since his formal campaign announcement, the US senator from South Carolina has spent about $3.6 million for ads running in Iowa, data from AdImpact show.

“Our rights don’t come from a government. They’re inalienable. They come from a creator. What’s missing in our public life so often are the values embedded in the Gospel,” Scott says in the ad. “If we want a better America, I think it starts with faith in God and faith in each other.”

The ad is Scott’s first to explicitly touch on his Christian values, but in speeches he has positioned his faith and personal story at the forefront of his campaign, discussing the challenges he overcame growing up poor in North Charleston, South Carolina, with the aim of offering voters a more optimistic alternative to other GOP candidates.

But Scott faces challenges in cutting through with a bloc that turned out overwhelmingly for former President Donald Trump in the 2016 and 2020 presidential elections and that is being wooed by other candidates in the crowded GOP field.

Trump is the current frontrunner for the GOP nomination and other candidates, including Mike Pence, his former vice president, and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, are making entreaties toward religious voters in the state.

There may be an opening for candidates. A March Des Moines Register Iowa Poll found Trump was viewed favorably by 58% of evangelicals and unfavorably by 39%. Polling in the 2016 Iowa caucuses showed that evangelical voters, who were 64% of Republican caucus goers, broke for US Senator Ted Cruz of Texas by 34% to Trump’s 22%.

Scott is among the Republican hopefuls scheduled to speak at the Family Leadership Summit in Des Moines, Iowa, on Friday — an opportunity to court the state’s evangelical voters in person.

Scott is currently fourth in the RealClearPolitics average of Iowa Republican polls at 3.7% — behind Trump at 47.7%, DeSantis at 23.7%, and fellow South Carolinian Nikki Haley at 4%. In RealClearPolitics average of national polls, Scott sits in fifth place at 3.3% — trailing Trump, DeSantis, Pence and Haley.

Most Read from Bloomberg Businessweek

©2023 Bloomberg L.P.