Monday Block 1

We couldn't think of a better person to join us on our first show of 2021 than senator tim scott.

A major make it or break it runoff race happens tomorrow in georgia and a new president is poised to be sworn in later this month, and we're still dealing with a pandemic, and happy new year.

Happy new year as well.

And congratulations to your 30th year, big 3-0 for him and 2021 is going to be a year to remember in a way that 2020 is a year to forget.

Leyla: oh, goodness gracious, and happy birthday to him.

And what a wild ride 2020 brought us, but i want to start with the georgia race.

You've been very active in your support for senators kelly lover and david perdue, and what are your thoughts if they win the election tomorrow and if they don't?

It's a difference between two different americans.

If there's a firewall between the republican party, because it's not about partisan, and it's about america.

And the firewall for america will be steadfast if we elect kelly leffler and david perdue, $4 trillion tax increase, it will protect us from stacking the supreme court.

Stacking the courts is really about nine supreme court justices is not enough.

Even though since for 150 years, it has been enough.

What some of the liberals want to do is add enough seats to the supreme court to change the conservative balance on the supreme court.

So if that takes 11 seats or 13 seats or 15 or 17 seats, it's un-american for us to really mess with our judiciary at the highest level.

But even beyond that, we would see the green new deal, a multitrillion dollars new proposal with only 20% of it having anything with the environment, 80% to do with things like i universal basic income.

Really ushering in socialism.

President trump fought tooth and nail against socialism and he brought us the fastest vaccine in the history of the world.

We need to continue to march down the right path as it relates to policies and the to look at the most inclusive economy ever created in the last four years.

I hope we spend a lot of time doing that in the next four years, and that will require a big win in georgia remain to.

With that, the differences between the two americas could not be more stark.

Leyla: i know that ambassador, nikki haley ex said that we are really headed down the socialist path and though it has failed everywhere it has been tried, that's where some of our leaders and lawmakers want to take us.

Is that a real threat?

I think it is, leyla.

When you look at the candidates running on the left, whether it's mr. warn okay or mr. ossoff, the one thing that they have been doing is flirting with socialism and doing business with the chinese, and this is not your run of the mill grandparent's party that we saw in georgia.

This is a brand spanking new leap toward socialism in a way that's hard to digest.

As someone said from the pulpit, you cannot love god and be in the military and that's what it anthetical to be an american.

When the other candidate is doing business with the chinese, that's anesthetic al to be an american.

It's a hard pill to swallow that there are individuals that are so far to the left that they're out of the main extreme even on the left.

These are not candidates like ronald reagan and tip o'neal, where they would fight all day and then go have a cup of coffee together.

Socialism is something that they bring with them into the into the senate and it has to be stopped.

Is it surprising that voters would vote for someone such as warn okay, who invited castro to his church?

Perceively more so in this election.

What are your thoughts?

Mr. warn off inviting castro, that's fariq abdul hamid to the left and when i look at what this looks like, the fact of the matter, because of president trump's vigilance of the voter signature process is very different tomorrow than it was in the one of the things, focusing their attention on the ballots to make sure that the signature verification and the matches are done on every single ballot.

That was something contested that was not done in the general election.

So i'm happy to see that because of the many lawsuits that we saw from president trump, we're now seeing more integrity in the election process and that's good for every single american from sea to shining sea, but most importantly, tomorrow it's good for every georgian.

This is a perfect place to take a break.

When we come welcome back, and we've been talking with senator tim scott.

And i want to talk about the pandemic, and you received your covid vaccine before replacement and how are you doing?

No side effects whatever, and thanks be to gad and for president trump for ushering in the vaccine at a record-breaking pates.

Absolutely.

And now we're hearing about this new strain coming to colorado from europe and do you anticipate that this year is going to be more of the same or do you think that now that we have the vaccine we're better protected?

We're certainly better protected and frankly, one of the things that's not as popular as they should be, we have lost hundreds of thousands of americans with out any question and that's a point to pause and to pray and be thankful for all of the work that has been done.

But about 99%, 99.8% of americans came into this year with their lives intact.

99.9% kim into the year with their lives intact.

So there's a lot of good news around covid-19, the response from the state and the federal government but more importantly, the response from every day people, doing what what's necessary to stop the spread of the virus, and then community organizations, churches and non-profits working with those.

That's what america looks like when we're doing our best.

We're not waiting for the government to show you.

We're doing our part every single day and that has been significant in diffusing the virus in a way that is measurable in the lives saved.

Because america and most importantly, americans stood up to be counted and did the right thing.

And you've been at the forefront of expanding telehealth in south carolina, so are we looking at better coverage overall and are we going to see that and is that a goal in 2021?

It's more of the priority, staying on healthcare and moving into the economy in order for us to have the highest quality of healthcare throughout rural south carolina and parts of charleston and the low country, we have to have telemedicine as part of the future.

It can not be part of the pandemic, it's a new day and i new opportunity for us to use telemedicine and telehealth to reach rural south carolinians as the best experts in the country.

And they can beam into your house.

And you just said a very important word.

Opportunity and that transitions into opportunity zones, so the economy took a big hit in 2020.

People are hopeful that 2021 is going to look better.

But with businesses still shut down across the country, what are we doing in terms of opportunity zones?

And here at home in south carolina to ensure that we have a robust economy moving forward?

Well, the exciting news is that we keep hearing more good news around developments for opportunity zones.

Using opportunity zones as the anchor.

The classic is in hampton county where we saw 100 jobs created in a poor area of south carolina using opportunity zones.

On top of the 1500, and in rockville, south carolina, the mayor of the city said that they're bringing affordable housing in downtown rockville for the first time in four decades because of the opportunity zones.

In the low country, the charleston tech center, going toward downtown, a $60 million project in an opportunity zone, already create tech jobs from outside of the state.

And now to grow some of the tech jobs organically.

And what a great thing to have, using opportunity zones to attract more job creators, more investors into the low country.

And do you think this is going against the grain of a lot of other states in the country that are still locking down and not allowing businesses to open?

What we're doing in south carolina, allowing businesses to continue to flourish and allow restaurants to open.

They said last year, 1.5% of the spread of the virus were connected to restaurants.

1.5%?

More than 50% home parties, things that were not in the public domain, which is really important for us to recognize.

So the importance of restarting and reigniting our economy at home in south carolina, but around the country is really important for us to make sure that we do whatever it takes to keep this economy growing so people have jobs.

Economic insecurity is going to cost us a lot if we're not careful.

And the good news is, people at least in south carolina are coming back to work in high numbers.

I just have finally, i wanted to ask you, senator tim scott, with president-elect joe biden being sworn in later this month, under a very large cloud of controversy from election fraud to his son, hunter biden's perceived dealings with china, do you foresee there being a special counsel and will republicans continue to push for answers once he's sworn into office?

We're going to continue to hold everyone accountable, including hunter biden for their dealings with the chinese, and there's no doubt it appears we're still holding on to a little bit of hope that there might be new revelations coming forward.

But ultimately, it appears that we'll have a new president on january 20th.

I think there's a cloud over this entire election and how we deal with that cloud will be very important.

How we deal with that from the oversight of senators is going to be key as we move into this next year.

We want every single american to have confidence in the voting process.

Elections are really state functions but we're going to make sure that we keep our eyes on the prize of having integrity in the elections.

One of the votes that we had 7 or 8 days ago had to do with election fraud and bringing more integrity into elections and resources into them.

And we'll continue to do so, and as the lawsuits continue to play out for the next couple of weeks, i hope president trump continues to avail himself to every legal effort possible to bring light to any fraud or buick that's part of the process, and we have to understand that election security is national security.

So it's really important for us to focus on how we proceed as americans, missing sure that there's transparency and integrity in that process.

With just 10 seconds left, i know you're a man of faith and any words of wisdom for a hopeful 2021?

I'm excited about the new year, i would say ephesians 3:20, all things are possible, and we should expect that the good lord and hard work will do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or imagine.

God bless.

Perfect, and thank you so much, senator tim scott.

And all of your hard work.

I know it has been a busy year for you.

Happy new