Tim Scott: ‘There’s no higher compliment than being attacked by President Obama’

Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) on Sunday brushed off comments former President Barack Obama made about his campaign last week, calling the former president’s remarks “a compliment.”

“There’s no higher compliment than being attacked by President Obama,” Scott said during an interview on “Fox News Sunday.”

The former president last week criticized Scott, a rare Black candidate in the GOP primary contest, for comments he has made about race and racism in America, saying that voters had a right to be “skeptical” of claims made by minority candidates that ignore the inequality that exists in the United States.

“There’s a long history of African American or other minority candidates within the Republican Party who will validate America and say, ‘Everything’s great, and we can make it,’” Obama said during a conversation with Democratic strategist David Axelrod on his podcast “Axe Files,” which was released last week.

“If somebody’s not proposing — both acknowledging and proposing — elements that say, ‘No, we can’t just ignore all that and pretend as if everything’s equal and fair. We actually have to walk the walk and not just talk the talk.’ If they’re not doing that, then I think people are rightly skeptical,” Obama added.

On Sunday, Scott pushed back on that notion, while welcoming the former president’s criticisms.

“Whenever the Democrats feel threatened, they drag out the former president and have him make some negative comments about someone running, hoping that their numbers go down,” he said.

Scott has repeatedly argued that America “is not a racist country,” pointing to his own experience growing up with a single mother and eventually reaching the halls of Congress.

“Here is what the people need to know: The truth of my life disproves lies of the radical left,” Scott said Sunday.

But the former president's remarks were about more than just one success story, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said Sunday.

"We're in a period right now where there are certain states, certain cities where they literally do not want to tell the truths about U.S. history," Bass said during an interview on CNN's "State of the Union."

"You can't just talk about the nice stories, George Washington's cherry tree, but not the 350 enslaved individuals that he had. All of it is the American story, and it all needs to be told, because we're not going to overcome the problems if we cannot even reflect on how we got where we are."