Senator Tim Scott has become the latest Republican to join an increasingly crowded 2024 race for president.
EDnews informs via BBC that Mr Scott, 57, who has represented South Carolina in the chamber since 2013, promised to revive America's "culture of greatness".
With about $22m (£18m) in cash on hand, he enters the fray with more campaign funds than any of his rivals.
Ex-President Donald Trump is currently the runaway front-runner among Republicans for the party's nomination.
At a launch event in his hometown of North Charleston on Monday, Mr Scott, who is black, touted his ascent to the US Senate as the grandson of a Deep South cotton field worker as an embodiment of the American dream.
He spoke of being raised by a single mother and how his family went "from cotton to Congress" in his grandfather's lifetime.
Mr Scott has previously spoken often of his experience as a black man in America, from being pulled over by police seven times in one year to being stopped inside the US Capitol building.
But in his campaign launch speech, he rejected the idea that the nation is defined by its racial divisions.
"I am living proof that America is the land of opportunity, not a land of oppression," he said, railing against the political left. "The truth of my life disproves their lies."
