Republican presidential hopefuls are learning fast: If you want to take this must-win primary state, pay a visit to hometown tea party hero Rep. Tim Scott.

"All of us in Washington, D.C., are extremely proud of you for choosing the right man to send from Charleston up to Washington. We love Tim Scott!" Michele Bachmann declared here Thursday night, standing with Scott in an auditorium in front of a backdrop featuring his visage and an image of the White House.

The appearances aren't happenstance. Scott has lured presidential candidates to make a stop in Charleston, offering intimate forums with the would-be Republican primary voters who will play a pivotal role in picking the next Republican nominee. And in the process, the local political favorite is establishing himself as South Carolina's newest kingmaker, a must-win endorsement in this early primary state.

"My bosses sit before you, Michele," Scott said, pacing the stage. "They are my friends, my neighbors and most importantly, they are my bosses. These bosses are looking for and will choose the right Republican to be the nominee to be the next president of the United States."

Bachmann is the second Republican candidate to appear in Scott's town hall series.

Former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman spoke to a friendly crowd of Scott's constituents earlier this month; the two teamed up on a rendition of "Hit the Road Jack" dedicated to President Barack Obama, Huntsman's former boss. Nearly all of the presidential campaigns have expressed interest in participating. Scott's House colleague, Trey Gowdy, said Newt Gingrich called him last week looking for Scott's number.

"We expect the presidential candidates to come through here and for us to get an up close and personal view of them," said South Carolina Speaker of the House Bobby Harrell, who rents Scott the space for his congressional office above his insurance company in a strip mall in the city. "What Tim's doing, though, is giving an individual forum to candidates, one at a time, using his popularity to help draw the crowd in to see the candidate."

Scott says the town halls are meant to bring the tea party and establishment Republican groups together, but one undeniable consequence is the elevation of his profile in the state, where insiders see him as an up-and-comer, a possible successor to Jim DeMint in the Senate or Nikki Haley in the governor's mansion.

"I believe his poll numbers would be higher than Jim DeMint's in the Charleston area," said Harrell, whose glossy booklets on the state Legislature's activities feature a photograph of the two men grinning in front of a Boeing podium.

"If I were a candidate for president or statewide office in South Carolina, Tim Scott and Jim DeMint's endorsements would be 1A and 1B in terms of my most highly coveted," Gowdy said.

The Bachmann town hall proved a friendly, if tightly scripted, showcase for the presidential candidate. Attendees were invited to write their questions for the candidate and Scott then selected them from a glass bowl. The questions provided Bachmann prompts for some of her favorite pet issues: railing against the EPA and an overcomplicated tax code.

At one point, when an overeager supporter of Bachmann's tried to gush about the congresswoman's record on immigration, Scott politely but repeatedly spoke over her until she sat down. Earlier in the event, an undecided voter named Nikki - the state's governor, Nikki Haley - appeared from behind the stage to embrace Bachmann and invited her to bash the president's record regarding the National Labor Relations Board's complaint against Boeing.

Scott's town halls are hosted by a number of local GOP and tea party groups, uneasy allies in the feverish pitch to find a nominee to defeat President Barack Obama in 2012. But his fans in the state describe him as the elected official who could unite the two groups: he is tea party in ideology and but not in temperament, able to keep one foot in official Washington, where he's an elected freshmen representative to the House leadership team, and one foot firmly planted in the South Carolinian tradition of political rebellion. That's evident in his frequent votes against party leaders on major bills like the continuing resolution and debt ceiling deal this year, when Scott and his fellow South Carolina freshmen refused to support leadership despite late-night lobbying efforts to bring the delegation on board.

"That's the whole dichotomy with Tim. It's not just this way now, it was this way when he was on county council and when he was in the Legislature," said Michael Sally, a friend and former business partner of Scott's who first bonded with the congressman at a Christian men's retreat in their 20s.

Scott, who served 13 years on the Charleston County Council as the first black Republican elected anywhere in the state since Reconstruction, consistently downplays the historical importance of his popularity in the state's political scene. But it is undeniable that a part of his success is rooted in his seemingly preternatural comfort operating in the most conservative of South Carolina's political circles, ones that were until recently seen as largely exclusive to whites. It lingers on the tips of the tongues of most everyone who searches for an explanation for his popularity.

"Obviously, having an African-American representative elected from the South, it's unique, it's an oddity, because the South is criticized for being so anti-black and anti-African American. It's refreshing," said Tommy Hartnett, who formerly held Scott's seat.

"We have a not-so-pretty history with regard to race. For conservative and Republican activists who unfairly get deemed with the stereotype of being racist, to have a guy who is incredibly conservative and just so happens to be black, it's part of the appeal," said a South Carolina Republican activist.

"Although he doesn't talk in those terms, he is historically significant," said Gowdy, who noted that he dreams of taking his children to visit Scott in the governor's mansion some day. "I'm proud of the fact that Tim Scott's the face of our congressional delegation and, in many respects, the future of the conservative movement in South Carolina."

Scott grew up in a poor, majority black neighborhood in North Charleston, raised by a single mother, a Christian conservative and disciplinarian who worked 16-hour shifts as a nurse's assistant in downtown Charleston, often driving to and from the hospital to make sure Scott and his brother, now an Army officer, were behaving in her absence. He only recently developed a close relationship with his father, also a military officer.

He misbehaved in school, at one point failing several classes - but Scott said he found more positive ways to get the attention he craved, such as football and student council. At 15, Scott began frequenting the Chick-fil-A adjacent to the movie theater where he sold concessions. The owner, John Moniz, approached Scott, and the two developed a mentorship that Scott says changed his life. "John taught me that you didn't necessarily have to be an entertainer to get out of poverty," Scott said. "All I saw were football players and entertainers. John said you can be a business owner."

Scott became one of the nation's top Allstate insurance agents. Yet he felt the pull of politics, and in the mid-90s ran for county council as an unapologetic conservative, nailing the Ten Commandments to the wall of the council chambers, raising hackles from secular groups but making him a hero among the Christian conservatives who dominate Charleston politics.

Later, as the state's only black Republican, he agreed to co-chair the reelection campaign of the nation's one-time leading segregationist, Sen. Strom Thurmond. ("I took a look at what he's done recently because his past is not very positive overall in the black community," Scott told The Post and Courier at the time. "Recently he has more of a positive effect in the black community.")

"People didn't understand Strom Thurmond. He was a very passionate person. It didn't matter your color, if you called his office and needed help, his staff helped you," said Dan Martin, another black conservative and a close friend and former business partner of Scott's who served as a clerk for Thurmond in the 1970s. "He did what he could for the time."

"At the end of the day, it's what you do that matters to my voters, not what you look like," Scott said. "I've seen the ugliness that comes with a racially divisive world, but I've experienced very consistently that if you represent what you are more than what you look like, people respond to it."

Of course, not everyone is enamored with Scott's brand of post-racial politics. "He's popular among Republicans, absolutely. He's someone they can roll out who is a tea party African American. How rare are they?" said Dick Harpootlian, chairman of the state's Democratic Party. "If you are willing to forgo any sense of conscience, or right or wrong, you can be a superstar in the Republican Party."

Still, there doesn't appear to be much downside to his hard-core conservatism in this deeply conservative district. "I don't believe he'll have any opposition from the Republican Party and I don't believe he'll be defeated," said Paul Thurmond, Strom's son, whom Scott defeated soundly in the primary.

Scott sets life goals in five-year increments, based on the teachings of motivational speakers like Zig Ziglar and Jim Rohn. He has limited himself to serving four terms, putting him in a position to run for governor or senator if DeMint doesn't run again. Still, he's coy about what's next on his next five-year plan.

"I'm not sure if I'm done [with politics] in eight years or not," Scott said. "Speaking, teaching, being a motivational guru of some sort in the future would be my dream job."