Sen. Kay Hagan is one of the harshest Democratic critics of President Obama’s handling of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, but until recently she was largely quiet on the issue.
A review of Hagan’s public statements, Senate website and transcripts of committee hearings shows she has raised the topic of the Islamic State only a few times, even as the chairwoman of a relevant subcommittee on emerging national security threats.
As a candidate fighting for re-election in a close race, it’s not surprising that Hagan would take on the topic now. She has distanced herself from the president on a host of hot-button topics, and ISIS has recently been elevated in the political discourse.
In Hagan’s first Senate debate against Republican Thom Tillis last week, she squarely blamed Obama for the spread of ISIS throughout Syria and into Iraq.
“The president should have weaponized the moderate Syrian rebels earlier,” Hagan said in the debate. “Without doing that, that has allowed ISIS to grow.”
That view has been advocated before by other Democrats, most notably former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who last month said it was a “failure” by the U.S. not to arm moderate rebels in Syria who might have stemmed the growth of ISIS. Within the administration, Clinton pushed for this outcome early, although she was ultimately overruled by the president.
But Hagan has been much less vocal about the threat of ISIS prior to her debate remarks and the issue has hardly been her central focus in Congress.
As chairwoman of the Senate Armed Services Emerging Threats Subcommittee, Hagan has monitored the threat posed by ISIS, but she has rarely discussed it in public hearings or other settings. At one hearing in April 2013, however, Hagan did ask whether the U.S. should “support” moderate rebels in Syria.
“Reports have emerged that there are some elements in the southern region of the country that are moderate in their views and in their intentions,” Hagan said. “Do you agree that the United States should provide additional support to elements in Syria that share our views and interests?”
Based on the transcript of the meeting, it appears this topic was discussed further in a subsequent closed session, but the content of those meetings is not made public.
Two other recent subcommittee meetings chaired by Hagan focused on counterterrorism, in April and January, but were also closed to the public. Hagan has not convened a meeting with the focus of ISIS in particular.
Other senators have made a point, some for years, to publicly advocate for actions to stem the growth of ISIS, even outside of the committee setting. In February 2012, Republican Sens. John McCain and Lindsey Graham, who often focus on foreign policy and national security issues, held a press conference in Kabul, Afghanistan, and called upon the president to arm the moderate Syrian rebels.
Graham and other senators raised the issue again, briefly, during a meeting of the full Senate Armed Services Committee in February, where National Intelligence Director James Clapper and Defense Intelligence Agency Director Lieutenant Michael Flynn testified. Hagan did not attend that meeting, although she sits on the committee.
Now, Tillis’ campaign is characterizing Hagan’s lack of public outcry prior to the debate as “silent support” for President Obama’s response to ISIS, which has lately been reactive, taking the form of targeted airstrikes on ISIS in Iraq.
“Sen. Hagan and President Obama’s complete lack of engagement on the rising threat of ISIS is deeply troubling, with the president previously referring to them as a ‘JV team,’ and Hagan nowhere to be found when the Director of National Intelligence briefed senators in February,” said Meghan Burris, a spokeswoman for Tillis.
Tillis, for his part, did not propose an alternative strategy during the debate. When asked whether the U.S. should strike ISIS, Tillis at first waffled, and then was vague.
“I think that the U.S. should take all actions to protect American citizens and protect freedom-loving people all over the country,” Tillis said. “I think that the president is, to a certain extent, now trying to solve a problem that his inaction created.”
In a statement, a spokeswoman for Hagan criticized Tillis on those “talking points,” saying they “do nothing to stop terrorism.”
“Sen. Hagan takes these issues very seriously, and they deserve more than the talking points and political posturing that Speaker Tillis has offered,” said Sadie Weiner, a spokeswoman for Hagan. “He ought to check the facts because it’s clear that going back to April of 2013 she was pushing the administration to arm the moderate Syrian rebels and warning of the potential for the violence to spill into Iraq.”
The question of how the U.S. and the president should act to stem the spread of ISIS has recently featured prominently on the campaign trail.
Some Democratic candidates, like Hagan, have opted to criticize the president on his strategy, including Sens. Al Franken and Mark Warner, who are up for re-election in Minnesota and Virginia, respectively. The issue has also begun to feature into ads, as with one released by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell in Kentucky last week.
A recent ABC News/Washington Post poll showed public approval ratings for the Obama’s foreign policy at the lowest point of his presidency — which could hurt Democratic candidates, particularly in the most hotly contested Senate battlegrounds.
