Sen. Tim Scott is prepping for Black History Month by planning a panel discussion on Feb. 25 to honor the country’s current and former black senators, Roll Call reports. Only nine African Americans—including Scott—have ever served in the Senate.
Former Sens. Carol Moseley Braun and Roland Burris of Illinois and former Sen. William "Mo" Cowan of Massachusetts, all Democrats, are already scheduled to attend the discussion, whose theme is "Honoring Our Past and Celebrating Our Future: Discussing Personal Journeys and a Nation’s Progress With America’s Black Senators."
Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.), former Sen. Edward Brooke (R-Mass.) and, of course, President Barack Obama, a former senator from Chicago, have all received invitations. Other past black senators are Hiram Rhodes Revels and Blanche Kelso Bruce, both Republicans who represented Mississippi in the 19th century.
Senate Chaplain Barry Black is expected to moderate the panel.
The news of the panel comes just as North Carolina’s NAACP president snubbed Scott, calling him a "dummy" for the Tea Party.
"A ventriloquist can always find a good dummy," the Rev. William Barber said during the speech in the senator’s home state. "The extreme right wing down here [in South Carolina] finds a black guy to be senator and claims he's the first black senator since Reconstruction and then goes to Washington, D.C., and articulates the agenda of the Tea Party."
Read more at Roll Call.