As one of millions of Americans concerned about the direction our country is headed under the current administration, I was thrilled with the news that President-elect Donald Trump selected my close friend Scott Turner as his nominee to lead the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.
As a former HUD Secretary, I know how important the role is, so I can confidently say that Scott is the perfect man for the job. Scott’s life story demonstrates some of the most important qualities of a leader and Cabinet secretary. He is ambitious, passionate, detail-oriented, and a steadfast defender of conservative values. These character traits don’t come easy; they result from years of hard work, faith in God, and pushing himself to be the best he can be over the course of decades, all of which have culminated in his nomination to be a Cabinet secretary.
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A native Texan, Scott was a standout athlete in high school, and his football and track skills led to numerous scholarship offers, including one from the University of Illinois. There, Scott excelled both on the track field and as a cornerback on the football team. In 1995, Scott was drafted into the NFL, which launched a nine-year career as a star cornerback and special teams captain with the Washington Redskins, the San Diego Chargers, and the Denver Broncos.
After his playing career came to a close, Scott continued to contribute to the sport by serving as a regional director for the NFL Players Association, a senior adviser to the NFL’s executive vice president of football operations, and a coach for his son’s high school football team.
But in 2012, Scott decided it was time to serve his country and ran to represent the over 170,000 Americans of Texas’s 33rd Congressional District in the state House. After an overwhelming electoral victory, Scott served two terms in office and worked on various House committees, which gave him valuable political experience that he draws on to this day.
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In April 2019, Trump tapped Scott to serve as the first executive director of the White House Opportunity and Revitalization Council. In this role, Scott worked closely with the HUD team to unite business, faith, education, and community leaders across the country to develop revitalization plans and achieve long-term, sustainable growth for America’s forgotten men and women. Under Scott’s leadership, 16 federal agencies initiated more than 200 policy actions to further this economic growth.
Furthermore, the transformative “opportunity zone” initiative raised over $50 billion in private funding to invest in impoverished areas by offering residents a “hand-up” rather than a “hand-out” and pulling the government back to empower the private sector with the tools it needs to succeed.
Scott currently serves as the founder and CEO of his family’s very own foundation, the Community Engagement and Opportunity Council, which aims to continue what has become Scott’s life mission and revitalize America’s forgotten communities through sports, mentorship, and opportunity.
But Scott has another quality, too — one that cannot be taught but might be the most important of all. This most fundamental quality is Scott’s ability to lead. All of his life experiences have helped Scott understand what it takes to be successful and inspire others around him to be successful as well. I can testify firsthand that every time Scott came to address our staff at HUD in his role as WHORC executive director, he captured the room, and our staff left each of these meetings with a renewed vigor and passion for their work.
These leadership qualities are the exact skills that our country’s leaders need if we are to reverse course. The last four years have shown us just how fragile our country’s future is and how quickly weak leadership, poor policy decisions, and the destruction of our fundamental values can send America into a tailspin.
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Thankfully, the American people saw the damage being done and rejected it at the ballot box this November. Instead, “we the people” decided to return to the policies that work, just like they worked four years ago under Trump’s leadership.
Scott played an enormous role in making those policies work back then, and I have the utmost confidence that he is the right man to make them work again. He is a husband, a father, and, above all, a man of God. I could not be happier with Trump’s decision to add Scott to his Cabinet, where he will put his compassion, knowledge, and leadership skills to work for the American people once again.
Ben Carson, M.D., served as the 17th secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development from 2017 to 2021.