Unsure of operator issue

[Jmarlin3]

I've been following the tutorial from Shaun Spaulding regarding Basic Artificial Intelligence

He constantly uses state_text in this form

state_text = ' ' ;

He uses a different word to identify which script it's using. The problem is everytime I use it, I get this error:
"unexpected unary operator ="
These are the instances I use it in:

scr_enemy_attack:

state_text = 'attack';

var dis = point_distance(x,y, o_player.x, o_player.y);
if (dis > attack_range) {
    // Chase
    state = scr_enemy_chase
} else {
    // Attack
    if (alarm[0] == -1) {
        o_player.hp -= 1;
        alarm[0] = 30;
            
        }

}

scr_enemy_idle:

state_text = 'idle';

var dis = point_distance(x,y,o_player.x,o_player.y);


if (dis <= sight_range)  {
    state  = scr_enemy_chase;
}

scr_enemy_attack:

state_text = 'attack';

var dis = point_distance(x,y, o_player.x, o_player.y);
if (dis > attack_range) {
    // Chase
    state = scr_enemy_chase
} else {
    // Attack
    if (alarm[0] == -1) {
        o_player.hp -= 1;
        alarm[0] = 30;
            
        }

}

Finally, in my enemy object, I have a drawing event with this:

draw_text(x,y,state_text);

That doesn't have any error warning, but everything else shows the same error.
Please help as much as possible.

 

[Smiechu]

You must use " " not ' '