September 22, 2020/Media

Ahead of #NCSen Debate, Tillis Signals His Biggest Weakness: No One Trusts Him Because He’ll Say Anything to Get Elected

In the last debate, Senator Tillis telegraphed his biggest weakness: that voters know he will say and do anything to get elected even if it means caving on his principles and putting himself before North Carolina. In both his opening and closing statements, Senator Tillis charged Cal with what Senator Tillis himself is best known for — saying one thing and doing another — and in turn revealed exactly why he’s consistently trailing Cal.

Senator Tillis has a long record of caving on his principles and lying to North Carolinians if he thinks it will help him get reelected, including as recently as yesterday:

  • On SCOTUS: Senator Tillis “has now improbably managed to outdo his last spectacular flip-flop” over the emergency declaration. This time, he’s cemented himself as a “rubber stamp” who is “clinging” on in a “desperate” hope after warning during 2016 against the same partisan “trap” he’s now put himself in.
  • On Protections for Pre-Existing Conditions: Senator Tillis over the weekend claimed “there’s nobody in the Senate who would vote to strip” away protections for people with pre-existing conditions — even though that’s exactly what he’s repeatedly done, going so far as to brag once that his vote ending those vital protections was “courageous.”
  • On the ACA: Senator Tillis has called the Affordable Care Act a “cancer” and said he’d vote for repeal “every time.” Yet last month he bragged that he “literally” lifted lines from the ACA for his own, inadequate health care bill.
  • On Offshore Drilling: Senator Tillis used his maiden floor speech on the floor of the U.S. Senate to advocate for expanding offshore drilling, but now that he’s “feeling the heat,” he’s trying to greenwash his record. It went over like an anchor, with one environmental activist saying the announcement is “terribly convenient” and that Tillis has “never supported our cause.

Saying one thing and doing another is exactly what Senator Tillis is best known for — and it’s the reason voters don’t trust him and he’s consistently trailing in the polls:

  • Non-partisan analyst: “He pleases nobody. Conservatives aren’t happy with him. Democrats aren’t happy with him.”
  • Cook Political Report: “The bottom line is that voters of all ideological stripes simply don’t trust Tillis.”
  • Charlotte Observer Editorial Board: “This is the problem with Tillis’s move to the center. He boasts of bipartisanship and files bills with Democrats on smaller-ticket issues, but when the big moments arrive, Tillis doesn’t. At least not as a centrist.”
  • Charlotte Observer Editorial Board: “We’re not sure which [Tillis] is real — and North Carolina voters apparently feel the same, if polls are any indication — but we do know when North Carolina noticed a shift this year.”
  • News & Observer Columnist: “Tillis campaigning to protect low income Tar Heels is like Donald Trump running on a truth and constitutionalism platform.”
  • NC-based political scientist: “You do one thing when you’re here at home and you do another thing when you’re in Washington DC, when it’s with them.”

Senator Tillis is flailing and telegraphing his own biggest weakness because he has no record of delivering for North Carolina and his record of caving on his principles has lost him voters’ trust.