Sen. Thom Tillis is one of the most vulnerable Republican incumbents, and the outcome of his fight for reelection in North Carolina will help determine which party controls the Senate in 2021.
Tillis, 60, faces Democrat Cal Cunningham on the Nov. 3 ballot, and polls show the race is a toss-up.
Cunningham, 47, is a former state senator who first ran for statewide office in 2010, when he made an unsuccessful bid for the Democratic nomination to challenge Sen. Richard Burr, a Republican.
Cunningham is a lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Army Reserve and is making affordable and accessible healthcare a top campaign issue in his fight to unseat Tillis.
Tillis, the former speaker of the North Carolina House who is serving his first term in the U.S. Senate, is running as a pro-jobs, pro-law enforcement lawmaker who backs the military and is supported by President Trump.
The two candidates have been attacking each other’s records and agendas in an effort to win over voters in what has become one of the most important swing states in the upcoming election.
A string of recent polls show Trump statistically tied with Democratic nominee Joe Biden. Trump won the state in 2016 by less than 4%.
Tillis is touting his support for and backing from Trump, who campaigned in the state earlier this month. Trump praised Tillis as “a great senator, a real friend of mine” and said Tillis “works very, very hard and loves the people of North Carolina.”
Tillis may be hoping to recapture the support of pro-Trump voters who were angered by his opposition in 2019 to the president’s move to shift federal funding to build a border wall. Tillis eventually sided with the president but not before expressing opposition to the move, which Trump said was a necessary response to the massive surge of illegal immigrants along the southern border.
Cunningham has attacked Tillis on healthcare and his opposition to expanding Medicaid in North Carolina. Cunningham has promised, if elected, to expand Obamacare and to help implement a public option for healthcare in North Carolina.
Cunningham, in September, seized on a recording made by a Democratic constituent who called a Tillis staffer to ask about how she could afford healthcare. The Tillis staffer told her, “You got to find a way to get it” and compared it to shopping for a dress shirt. Cunningham is also promoting a report that the 2014 Tillis for Senate campaign received $300,000 from the employees of a company run by current Postmaster General Louis DeJoy, a Trump appointee Democrats are attacking over late mail delivery.
The Tillis campaign said it had no knowledge of accusations that DeJoy pressured employees to donate the money.
Tillis continues to attack Cunningham’s record, his alliance with Biden, and a liberal agenda that includes green energy reforms and tax increases.
He’s counting on North Carolina’s pro-law enforcement, pro-military, and center-right voting base to help him win.
“We all need to understand the North Carolina of today is ‘the swingiest of swing states,’” Tillis campaign consultant Paul Shumaker said in a recent blog post. “It is winnable for both sides. The Democrats have been very strategic, if not outright collaborative, on their efforts to make this race all about Thom Tillis. We must make this race about Cal Cunningham and his connection to the radical left. If we do that, we will win.”
