"I went through the entire bill. I'm not going to say I read every single letter on every single page," Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) told CNN's Jake Tapper. | Mark Wilson/Getty Images Scott defends rushed process to finish tax bill

South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott on Sunday defended the rushed process for Senate Republicans to pass a wave of tax cuts but admitted he didn't read the entire bill before voting on it.

Democrats attacked the process, which saw the final bill text released Friday just hours before the vote, and with hand-written changes in the margins, as well as crossed-out text. A Democratic proposal to delay the vote until Monday to give senators time to read the legislation was rejected.


"I went through the entire bill. I'm not going to say I read every single letter on every single page," Scott told host Jake Tapper on CNN's "State of the Union."

"I did not read 470 pages. But have I read every aspect of that bill before it was fused together? The answer is yes. We have had the chance over the last three years, since I have been on the committee, to work on every aspect of the bill."

Scott argued that Republicans, particularly on the Senate Finance Committee, had long debated and understood what was in the legislation. The bill passed 51-49 early Saturday morning.

"The last hearing that we had was a 23-hour hearing. We had 63 Democrat amendments that were offered. The suggestion that this was not done in the light of day and the last-minute changes, as they talk about them, were last-minute changes that had been envisioned for weeks," Scott said, adding later: "The suggestion that we had so little time to take a look at 500 pages is inconsistent with the truth."