Is Tim Scott a dark horse candidate in the Republican presidential primary?

I like Tim Scott. I’m not alone. He is picking up some steam in early-voting states, inching up in the polls. Big Republican donors are moving his way, he has a positive message and a compelling personal story.

The junior senator from South Carolina is a happy warrior, which is very appealing in today’s political atmosphere where anger and, in the case of Trump, revenge, are often the foundation of campaign stump speeches. Republican primary voters seem to like him.

In the new Fox Business poll out Sunday, Tim Scott has risen in Iowa to third place. Trump is still solidly out front by 30 points and Iowa caucus-goers see him as the one who can win in 2024. Trump is at 46%, in the top spot alone. In second place is DeSantis at 16% and Tim Scott is in third place at 11%.

The rest of the candidates land this way – Vivek Ramaswamy is at 6%, Haley at 5%, Pence at 4%, and Christie and Doug Burgum at 3%. Asa Hutchinson and Francis Suarez are at 1%. Larry Elder and Will Hurd are less than 1%.

The thinking is that Scott is perfectly positioned to rise to the top if Trump collapses due to his legal problems and the criminal cases or if DeSantis is no longer the second-place contender. The question is whether or not either of those scenarios will happen. At this point, it looks like Trump supporters are holding firm in their support for Trump. DeSantis is rebooting his campaign so we’ll know soon enough if he can turn things around. Someone has to chip away at Trump’s lead or he will cruise to the nomination.

Andy Sabin, a wealthy metals magnate who switched his allegiance from Mr. DeSantis to Mr. Scott and is hosting a fund-raiser for three dozen wealthy donors in the Hamptons next month, cited his frustration with the front-runners and said he hoped that more in the donor class would join him in backing Mr. Scott. Prospective donors, Mr. Sabin said, “all want to see what he’s about.”

“They’re disenchanted with Trump and DeSantis,” he said. “And the others, I’ve seen very little momentum.”

Tim Scott has ramped up his ad buys in Iowa and focuses on evangelical voters. Nine out of ten Iowa Republican primary voters identify as Christian. Scott is a man of faith and can comfortably talk about his faith to audiences. He often inserts Bible verses or stories in stump speeches. It never sounds forced or phony with him. Trump likes to brag that evangelical voters are his biggest supporters in Iowa but that may have changed since 2020. He dissed Iowa primary voters by taking a pass on attending the Family Leadership Summit, the cattle call with Tucker Carlson as the other GOP candidates did. It made Trump look entitled and it was disrespectful to Iowa primary voters. The Family Leadership Summit is a big deal with evangelical voters who want to hear from the candidates. Trump, however, thinks he is owed the GOP nomination and shouldn’t have to be on a debate stage with candidates who are so far behind him in polls.

By the way, the rumor is that Trump will not attend the first GOP debate next month and instead will hold a competing event that night. The scuttlebutt is that he and Tucker will do an event together to take the focus off of the first debate which will be seen on Fox. Stay tuned for that rumor. Would you watch the debate to see the candidates on a stage together and compare them or would you tune in to Trump and Tucker instead?

Tim Scott is also rising in New Hampshire, the first primary state. One state poll puts Scott in third place in that early-voting state, too.

Since he entered the race in May, Mr. Scott’s standing has slowly crept up in Iowa and New Hampshire. A University of New Hampshire poll of likely voters, out Tuesday, found him in third place among the state’s primary voters, with 8 percent of the vote, ahead of former Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey and former Gov. Nikki Haley of South Carolina, both of whom have focused intensely on the state.

Tim Scott has the attention of other potential big donors. He has plans to remain in the race.

Mr. Scott’s strength in early states has caught the eye of other potential donors, including the billionaire cosmetics heir Ronald Lauder, who met with Mr. Scott in South Carolina this month. In August, Mr. Scott will make a fund-raising swing through at least five states, including Colorado, Tennessee and Wisconsin.

While he has not been as much of a presence on the campaign trail as his rivals have, Mr. Scott and his allied groups have poured considerable money into Iowa and New Hampshire, spending $32 million to run ads through January 2024 — more than any other Republican candidate or group on the airwaves, according to the tracking firm AdImpact. Mr. Scott is the only Republican contender who has booked ad time that far ahead.

Tim Scott has one of the largest war chests in the primary race. He can hang in there and see if he catches fire. He’s on his way. The debates will be an important measuring stick for checking out how candidates handle themselves under pressure.