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| Anti-gay, anti-minority bigot Thom Tillis |
The Republican Party candidate for the U.S. Senate is Thom Tillis, the GOP speaker of the North Carolina General Assembly, who helped push through the draconian, reactionary agenda to the south of Virginia's border. Tillis was also a moving force behind the GOP/Christofascist backed Amendment 1 which amended North Carolina's constitution to enshrine anti-gay bigotry. With Amendment 1 now ruled unconstitutional, Tillis is continuing his disingenuous campaign of lies and untruths - untruths such as claims that a majority of North Carolina voters approved Amendment 1 even though less than one third of voters actually went to the polls to vote on Amendment 1. The Charlotte Observer looks at the new ripple in the heated contest. Here are excerpts:
Appeals of several states’ bans on same-sex marriage that bounced around the federal judiciary last week culminated Friday with a judge legalizing same-sex unions in North Carolina – just a little more than three weeks before the general election.
Over the weekend, Republican and Democratic campaigns started assessing what that might mean for them.
It is particularly relevant in the race for U.S. Senate, since the constitutional amendment that North Carolina voters approved in 2012 was put on the ballot by the state House Speaker Thom Tillis and the GOP-controlled General Assembly. It was declared unconstitutional by a judge President Barack Obama appointed at Democratic Sen. Kay Hagan’s recommendation the previous year.
The ruling intensifies the two distinct strategies that the two have employed: Tillis tying Hagan to Obama and the president’s policies, and Hagan connecting Tillis to the state legislature, where a Republican revolution during the past three years has led to controversy and legal challenges.
Chris Sgro, executive director of Equality NC, which fought the amendment, says Tillis is misleading voters when he claims a majority of voters in the state approved the amendment – since fewer than one-third of the registered voters turned out – as justification for vowing to continue the legal fight to preserve it. “I really think the gamble that Thom Tillis took to appeal to the smallest part of his base is not going to pay off,” Sgro said. “Tillis really needs to win moderates.”
After the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to take up any of the legal challenges to several states’ marriage bans, and again following U.S. District Judge Max Cogburn Jr.’s ruling Friday, Tillis said North Carolina would continue to challenge it in court, because he thought it was his responsibility to carry out the voters’ decision.
Michael Bitzer, a Catawba College political science professor, said the ruling could lead to higher turnout on both sides. In addition to bringing out social conservatives for Tillis, “it could energize urban Democrats, and that would certainly help Kay Hagan,” Bitzer said. “It could have the effect of helping both candidates.”
Bitzer says there’s a chance Tillis’ efforts to fight the ruling could hurt him among more moderate suburban voters. Some might see it as a waste of tax dollars to fight an inevitable change.
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