Professional Career: Owner, Southern Group; agent, Principal Financial Group, 1993-2010.
Political Career: GA House, 1997-2010.
Ethnicity: White/Caucasian
Religion: Baptist
Family: Married (Vivien); 1 children
The new congressman from the 8th Congressional District is Austin Scott, a Republican who upset four-term incumbent Democrat Jim Marshall in 2010. Scott was born in Augusta, Ga. His father was an orthopedic surgeon and his mother was a teacher. He graduated from the University of Georgia with a degree in risk management and insurance in 1992. After college, Scott opened an insurance brokerage firm, which he continues to operate today. Scott had a child with his first wife, but they divorced in 2001. He remarried and now lives with his son and second wife, Vivien Scott. Read More
The new congressman from the 8th Congressional District is Austin Scott, a Republican who upset four-term incumbent Democrat Jim Marshall in 2010. Scott was born in Augusta, Ga. His father was an orthopedic surgeon and his mother was a teacher. He graduated from the University of Georgia with a degree in risk management and insurance in 1992. After college, Scott opened an insurance brokerage firm, which he continues to operate today. Scott had a child with his first wife, but they divorced in 2001. He remarried and now lives with his son and second wife, Vivien Scott.
Scott first won election to the state House at 26. He sponsored a bill to provide better funding for the state’s trauma-care system. He also championed the expansion of charter schools and allowing students to express their religious beliefs in schools. In January 2009, Scott got into the Georgia governor’s race. To boost awareness of his campaign, he went on a 1,000-mile walk around the state, talking to voters. He made his 64-day journey in the height of summer, losing 7 pounds in the process. But his campaign failed to gain traction, and after briefly considering running for lieutenant governor, he decided to challenge Marshall. Scott won the July GOP primary with little trouble.
Although Marshall ranked as one of the most conservative Democrats in Congress, and voted against President Obama’s health care bill, he was vulnerable in 2010 simply because he was a Democrat. In his campaign against Marshall, Scott promised to reduce the deficit, and he attacked the incumbent for voting for Obama’s $787 billion economic stimulus bill, which Scott claimed paid to create jobs in China. Marshall was difficult to paint as a traditional liberal. He was endorsed by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the National Rifle Association. In one ad, Marshall showed his driver’s license to prove that he wasn’t House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who became a Republican symbol of the reviled Democratic agenda in Congress. Still, he lost the seat to Scott, who got 53% of the vote to 47% for Marshall.
When he got to Washington, Scott’s leadership qualities were apparent to his fellow GOP freshmen, who chose him as their class president.
National Journal’s rating system is an objective method of analyzing voting. The liberal score means that the lawmaker’s votes were more liberal than that percentage of his colleagues’ votes. The conservative score means his votes were more conservative than that percentage of his colleagues’ votes. The composite score is an average of a lawmaker’s six issue-based scores. See all NJ Voting
More Liberal
More Conservative
2012
2011
Economic
-
(L) : 99 (C)
-
(L) : 90 (C)
Social
(L) : 91 (C)
17
(L) : 74 (C)
Foreign
-
(L) : 91 (C)
41
(L) : 57 (C)
Composite
3.2
(L) : 96.8 (C)
22.8
(L) : 77.2 (C)
Interest Group Ratings
The vote ratings by 10 special interest groups provide insight into a lawmaker’s general ideology and the degree to which he or she agrees with the group’s point of view. Some organizations provide just one combined rating for 2009 and 2010, the two sessions of the 111th Congress. About the interest groups.
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the governors and the states is published in print form after the national elections every two years by the National Journal Group in Washington D.C. Read More
The first Almanac of American Politics was published in 1971, and it hasn’t missed an election since.
The nation’s most authoritative source of information about members of Congress, their districts,
the governors and the states is published in print form after the national elections every two years by the National Journal Group in Washington D.C.
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Jay Rockefeller Sen. Jay Rockefeller of West Virginia stunned political observers when he announced on Jan. 11 that he would not seek a sixth term in 2014. The Democrat is the state's senior senator, and chairs the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee.
Jay Rockefeller Sen. Jay Rockefeller of West Virginia stunned political observers when he announced on Jan. 11 that he would not seek a sixth term in 2014. The Democrat is the state's senior senator, and chairs the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee.
