And they’re off! What Hagan and Tillis need to do post Labor Day

by | Sep 2, 2014 | 2014 Elections, Editor's Blog, US Senate | 3 comments

Labor Day is over and election season officially kicks into high gear. As if to welcome it, Thom Tillis and Kay Hagan meet in the their first debate tomorrow night.  While only a few people may actually watch the debate, the press will. Through that prism, people will determine who won and who lost.

Locked in a dead heat, both candidates need to define themselves. Voters only have a fuzzy picture of either candidate despite their high profile jobs. So far, they’ve been defined more by outside groups than their own campaigns. An hour in front of the cameras is a chance to add some nuance and substance to the one-dimensional caricatures described by the millions of dollars of third party ads. 

However, short of a major screw up, this first debate is not likely to dramatically change the trajectory of the race. Over the next nine weeks Hagan and Tillis will need to connect some dots while not making any missteps. 

For her part, Hagan needs to keep the attention focused on Tillis’ record as Speaker. North Carolinians are angry at both the tone and substance of the House he led. Under his leadership, legislators ridiculed educators and underfunded public schools and teachers while giving huge tax breaks to the wealthy at a time when many people are still struggling to recover from the Great Recession. 

In addition, they’ve made environmental concerns a real issue for the first time since hog lagoons were mudding the water. On his watch, they fast-tracked fracking without properly evaluating how to protect both land owners and water. Tillis avoided deciding who should pick up the tab for the coal ash spill so as not to upset his donors at Duke Energy. Both issues could bite him in certain parts of the state.

At some point, Hagan needs to shift from just what he did to why he did it. Her campaign and their allies need to make the case that Tillis’ action as Speaker are predictive of how he’ll behave in the Senate. That, though, should be their closing argument. In the short term, we’ll continue to hear about his record.

Tillis, for his part, needs to shift the conversation away from the legislature and into the national dialogue. Fortunately for him, the latest session of the legislature was less contentious than last year’s. The fights were mainly intra-party squabbles between the House and Senate instead of massive rallies protesting the entire GOP agenda.

Still, Tillis needs to separate himself from the General Assembly and the revolution that he led. And the GOP has to find a message. Their Obamacare argument only works on the base and their voting-with-the-president campaign doesn’t have a whole lot of punch since Obama’s problem is less about what he’s done than what he hasn’t.

Tillis needs to find a way to make the election more about Hagan and less about him. Running against an incumbent usually means giving voters a solid reason to fire her. So far, though, the debate has been more a referendum on his record than hers. To win, he’ll need to change that.

Despite holding prominent offices, both candidates are relatively undefined in the minds of voters. Neither has much of a record to run on. As a freshman Senator who kept a relatively low profile, Hagan doesn’t have a signature accomplishment on which to hang her hat. With polls showing little widespread support for the most prominent policies pushed through the legislature last year, Tillis needs to separate himself from his single strongest qualification–leading the state House. 

Once again, this election will be more about who North Carolina doesn’t want than who they do. 

3 Comments

  1. Jim Amsden

    Tillis is playing out the same old tired and discredited Republican talking points, especial on ACA hoping low information voters will vote their fears not their interests, and high information voters will be so disgusted we’re still having this conversation they won’t bother voting at all. This is a sad state for modern politics where the public interests are sacrificed for the obscene wealth of a few. We all need to get out and vote for outcomes, not ideology.

  2. Matthew Scheer

    This race is very simple. On November 5, there will be one of two narratives. Narrative 1) Kay Hagan was successful in linking Thom Tillis to the unpopular state legislature in voters minds. Narrative 2) Once again, Democrats are unable to piece together Obama’s winning coalition in an off year election when Obama is not at the topic of the ticket attracting voters to the polls.

  3. Timothy Shinn

    Senator Hagan needs to focus on getting people to the polls. If she can get voters out, Tillis does not have a chance. Women voters overwhelmingly do not like him, nor do minorities. He’s even unpopular in his own State district and surrounding areas because of the I-77 toll lane debacle.

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