BYRON — Marshall Scott, 87, was born the year after Democrat Franklin D. Roosevelt won his second term and grew up on a farm in Taylor County, halfway between Macon and Columbus.
He put in 40 years at Robins Air Force Base in Houston County, 28 years in the Georgia National Guard and has been a Republican for as long as he can remember.
“My daddy was a Democrat,” Scott recalled, adding that his father used to tell him and his brothers, “Y’all folks don’t know nothing about no Democrats. I didn’t have nothing until Mr. Roosevelt. We was running around with no shoes on our feet. He put me to walking. He put me to riding. ... I don’t want to hear nothing about y’all Republicans.”
Scott can’t name the first GOP candidate he backed for president. He did vote for Jimmy Carter the first time, in 1976, “because he was from Georgia.”
“Democrats, we didn’t leave them; they left us,” Scott said.
Credit: Joe Kovac Jr.
Credit: Joe Kovac Jr.
Since the late 1960s, he has lived in Byron, in a tree-lined neighborhood on Main Street, walking distance from Byron City Hall. The Peach County town, which cozies up to I-75, about 10 minutes south of Macon, long has leaned GOP.
For the past four decades, presidential races in Peach County have been decided by slim margins. But Byron is a Republican stronghold. In the 2020 election, about two-thirds of its 5,746 votes went to Trump.
Scott began working at Robins in 1955 in the materials-supply department. He retired in 1995. Mary, his wife of 64 years, died in April at age 82. She worked on the base for a few years before spending most of her career in the banking business. She played piano and organ at their church, Byron Baptist.
When a newspaper reporter spent a couple of hours with him in his living room recently to talk about his views on the presidential campaign, Scott was quick to point out that “I don’t take any papers now.”
He quit subscribing in recent years. He watches weather reports on television, but not the local newscasts.
“They’re just about liberal, too,” he said.
He prefers Fox News and Fox Business Network.
The way Scott sees it, the U.S. has to get its southern border under control. He has heard Democrats “want to let the illegals vote.”
“I’m not against all immigration,” he said. But he’s against opening the borders and saying, “Come on in, we’ll take care of you.”
Scott figures there are “a lot of things Democrats and Republicans agree on if they could just get together.”
He is against abortion, with the exception of cases involving rape or a mother’s health.
“I cannot go along with these ladies saying, ‘You’re taking my right to choose,’” Scott said. “Who’s speaking for that little baby?”
He describes former President Donald Trump as economically astute, “a businessman.” He can’t fathom some people’s contempt for him.
“Why do people hate him or make fun of him because he wants to make America great again?” Scott said.
Sure, he’s aware that Trump’s trademark name-calling rubs some the wrong way.
“I don’t think he would make a (good) Sunday school teacher. … But I basically think that he’s morally good.” Scott said.
Scott sees himself having more in common with Trump.
“I just about believe in all that he stands for. I know that I’m pro-life. Of course, he’s given it over to the states now; he says to let them handle it. I’m for taking care of America first. And these people that’s coming in, I’d put a stop to it — the first day. (Trump) said he would. Not only put a stop to it, go gather them up and send them back to where they come from,” Scott said.
Scott refers to Vice President Kamala Harris as “this lady we got running against” Trump.
“We don’t even know what she stands for,” he said. “She’s gonna give $25,000 to people to start a house. Where’s that money going to come from? It’s going to come from me. She’s going to raise taxes.”
Scott also worries about “climate-control stuff.”
“I don’t buy this climate change. The good Lord, he made this Earth, and what little bit we’d save here in America is not going to have an effect on the world as a whole,” he said.
Scott calls himself a proud Christian, a law-and-order man. He doesn’t concern himself with Trump’s bluster.
“I’m worried,” he said, “about the big things.”
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