It's 505 and welcome in to a Monday edition of the Carolina Journal News Hour, News Talk 1110-993 WBT. I'm Nick Craig. Good Monday morning to you.
Some major North Carolina political news over the weekend, making big time national news. Following a public condemnation from President Donald Trump, one of our two Republican senators in North Carolina, Tom Tillis, released a statement yesterday saying that he will officially not run for reelection coming up here in 2026. In his statement, the senator said, quote, it has been a blessing to go on the journey from living in a trailer park and making minimum wage as a young man to having the honor of serving as a U.S. Senator for North Carolina. I am proud of my career in public service, including hard-fought.
Victories like passing historic tax reform as North Carolina Speaker and working with the Senate to help pass the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act and confirm three conservative Supreme Court justices and counting. This decision follows Tillis' decision to join Democrats and Senator Rand Paul, the Republican from Kentucky, in rejecting a procedural vote over the big, beautiful bill on Saturday. citing concerns about how Medicaid funding and other issues in the bill. It drew direct criticism from President Trump, who accused Tillis of being missing in action and stated in multiple posts on Truth Social that he would work to try and find a primary challenger to run against Tillis in the 2026 primary elections, which will be coming up in the early parts of March next year. Tillis has had a split relationship with the White House over the two terms of President Donald Trump over key issues like immigration reform and executive authority to impose tariffs.
Tillis's reputation as a pragmatist, his willingness to work across the aisle are among some of the points that he claims he's most proud of. Continuing with his statement last his statement yesterday afternoon, he writes, quote, what I'm most proud of are the bipartisan victories, passing the first in the nation eugenics compensation as Speaker and working across the aisle in the Senate to pass the largest investment in mental health in American history. as well as passing the Respect for Marriage Act and monumental infrastructure investments, as well as reestablishing the Senate NATO Observation Group.
Sometimes those bipartisan initiatives got me in trouble with my own party, but I wouldn't have changed a single one. Back a couple of years ago, 2023, the North Carolina GOP Convention delegates voted to censure Tillis over some of those initiatives. His statement on Sunday continued highlighting some of the divisive nature that he claims exists in Capitol Hill, writing, In Washington over the last few years, it has become increasingly evident that leaders who are willing to embrace bipartisanship, compromise, and demonstrate independent thinking are becoming endangered species. Democrats recently lost two such leaders who were dedicated to making the Senate more of a functional and productive legislative body. Referring to Joe Manchin and Kristen Sinema, he continued by saying they got things done, but they were shunned after they courageously refused to cave to their party bosses to nuke the filibuster for the sake of political expediency.
They ultimately retired, and their presence in the Senate chamber has been sorely missed every day since. This news yesterday will leave and is leaving a massive hole in the North Carolina electorate that will have to be filled over the next couple of months as we get into the latter parts of this year in the early parts of 2026. Donna King and Mitch Cokey of the John Locke Foundation and CarolinaJournal.com continue the discussion this morning on the Carolina Journal News Hour. Big news in North Carolina politics as two-term U.S. Senator Tom Tillis has announced he is not running for re-election.
Joining me to talk about all of the implications of this announcement, Donna King, who is the editor-in-chief of Carolina Journal, along with being the executive vice president of the John Locke Foundation. Donna, this is big political news. It is. It is really big news. It's not just North Carolina news.
This has made national news over the last several hours, of course. You know, the biggest thing, one, is that it leaves an open seat here in North Carolina for the U.S. Senate, which is a very, very tight race likely to happen. And there's already names being tossed around for a potential replacement for Senator Tillis in that open primary now. There's been some rumblings that there was going to be a difficult primary season for Tillis.
That said, it did actually catch me a little bit by surprise that he made this decision. Decision. But he says it really was not a hard choice, that he wanted to spend time with his family. And he really had divisive, you know, what he was seeing as a divisive culture and atmosphere on Capitol Hill. You mentioned the surprise factor, and I think all of us are at least somewhat surprised.
But then, once you think about it, in retrospect, maybe not a surprise, because this was going to be a really tough reelection battle for Tom Tillis. It really was. I mean, he had a very narrow win in 2020 with Cal Cunningham. And those are those that race really came down to the wire. And these are really, really tight numbers and lots of fundraising.
One of the most closely watched, most expensive Senate races. 2026 was bound to be very, very similar. There's even been talk that maybe former Governor Roy Cooper might jump in for the Democrats, and that would be a very difficult race. Our poll at Carolina Journal has found that Tillis's approval rating south of 26% here in North Carolina. And other polls have shown that Cooper might lead him by even if it's just a point or two.
Yeah, and I'm glad you mentioned the polling and also the fact that this is going to be a really tough reelection battle for Tom Tillis had he decided to do it. As I've been reflecting on this, There seem to be a number of challenges, and probably starting with the fact that you really can't identify. Who is Tom Tillis's electoral base right now? If you look at the pro-Trump. faction within the Republican Party, which is the bulk of the Republican Party.
They're not fans of Tom Tillis because of the times that he has strayed from Donald Trump's agenda, most recently on that vote on the so-called big beautiful bill, but on other occasions as well. Longtime conservative activists in North Carolina have not been big fans of Tom Tillis over the years, going back to his earliest days on a statewide stage. They have not been big fans. When he ran for the Senate the first time, he was not the first choice among the really activists within the Republican Party.
So he doesn't have that base. The much smaller sliver of the Republican Party that is the anti-Trump faction. They might have Coalesced around Tom Tillis, but they aren't big fans of his because he has been with the president on enough occasions and has said good things about the president on enough occasions that that really wouldn't make him a strong candidate among the anti-Trumpers. Then, of course, Democrats want a Democrat to be in there, and they'll especially want a Democrat if it's Roy Cooper. And then, if you look at the moderates, the unaffiliated, the people who could swing an election one way or the other.
Maybe they would go for Tom Tillis, but if he had to win a primary and spell out his conservative credentials, that might have soured the middle-of-the-road people on him.
So it was really hard to identify a Tom Tillis voting base. It really is. I mean, he's kind of in a can't-win situation, it seemed like, just because, you know, he really is stuck between a Republican base that is fiercely loyal to Trump and then Democrats who are just eyeing his vulnerability and looking for a spot to put a Democrat in that seat and claim it for their side.
So it is difficult. And he has, I mean, statistically, he's voted with the Trump administration about 90% of the time, but there were some key votes that got a lot of attention, like this one. He said a lot of good things about the Big Beautiful bill, but he had some concerns about Medicaid, particularly since North Carolina expanded Medicaid in 2023, adding on 600,000 or more folks to that federal entitlement. Program.
So he had some concerns about how that money was being spent or not spent in the big beautiful bill. But he also really split from the White House on things like executive authority to impose tariffs and some of these other things. The Pete Hedge Seth, if you remember it now, that seems like it was so long ago. But the conflict over his appointment to Secretary of Defense.
So there have been some really high-profile splits from the White House, even though he has voted along with the Trump administration's policies and agendas in most of the cases. We will continue the discussion. A major political news over the weekend. U.S. Senator Tom Tillis announcing that he is officially not running for reelection.
That coming up here in just a few minutes on the Carolina Journal News Hour. To jump out. Looking for excitement? Chumba Casino is here. Play anytime, play anywhere.
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It's 5:22. Welcome back to the Carolina Journal News Hour. News Talk 1110-99.3WBT. Continuing our coverage this morning of U.S. Senator Tom Tillis's announcement yesterday that he will not be seeking re-election in what was expected to be an incredibly tough general election coming up in November of next year.
Back last month, Carolina Journal conducted our Maya poll, and we asked voters across the state of North Carolina what their favorability or unfavorability view was of the current Senator Tom Tillis. Looking at the responses of that poll, only 26.4% of voters said that they had a favorable view of the current sitting senator, with 8% saying that they saw him very favorably, 18.4% saying that they Saw him somewhat favorably. His unfavorable rating significantly higher at 46.1%, very unfavorable at 27%, and somewhat unfavorable at 19%. You compare and contrast that to the likes of former Governor Roy Cooper. His favorability rating over 47.5%, with 33% of voters finding him very favorable, 14% somewhat favorable, and his unfavorability rating only sitting at 36%.
With the vast majority of those, again, seeing the former governor as favorable, very unfavorable, 24%, somewhat unfavorable, 12%. As we look at this race and what was likely to play out here in North Carolina, as of course, we would have a primary election, still will rather, have a primary election coming up in March of next year. Then we will, of course, sprint from then all the way to the general election in November with midterm elections, which, of course, are always tough for the political party that is already in power, which is currently the Republicans controlling the Oval Office and both branches of Congress. Currently, it was going to be and will continue to be a very tough election for Republicans, not only here in North Carolina, but across the rest of the United States. Continuing the discussion this morning with Mitch Coke of the John Locke Foundation and Donna King, the editor-in-chief.
Chief of CarolinaJournal.com. You referenced a little bit earlier the statement that he put out, and I found it very interesting. It could have been very short saying, you know, I want to spend time with my family, and I'm going to spend the rest of my time serving the people of North Carolina. And he said those things, but he also went into some great detail about being happy with his conservative work, leading the tax reform efforts when he was the state House Speaker and helping to pass the original Trump tax cut bill the first time that Donald Trump was in the White House. But then he also talked about some of the bipartisan measures, the eugenics compensation in North Carolina, some of the other things that he had done on Capitol Hill in a bipartisan fashion.
And then to me, the part that really struck me most about that statement was the fact that he Did not take aim at President Trump. He didn't really say anything bad about President Trump, but he did criticize the people within the Republican Party while also alluding to some people in the Democratic Party who would fall into the same type of camp, but really criticizing those within the Republican Party who were not willing to accept any. defection, or even any questioning. Of things coming out of the Trump administration. He basically said, you know, that's not the way I operate.
I operate in a way that's working across the aisle, being bipartisan, questioning. And in fact, a lot of the things that Tom Tillis has done have basically been in the camp of. A member of Congress acting as a member of Congress and not just deferring to the executive, which for a lot of People who have been traditionally conservatives, they'd say that's what Congress should do. Congress should be a check on the executive and saying, well, wait a minute, some of these things might not be as good as they're being counted to be. But Tillis was saying in this statement that.
You can't operate when no one within the party is going to accept any defection at all from the Trump administration. Sure. In fact, that's one of the things he said in the statement that he was most proud of: his ability to reach across the aisle and compromise and be pragmatic in his approach to legislating. He mentioned, he even referred to the danger involved with the recent assassination of another lawmaker in another state in Minnesota. and said, look, you know, we see what happens when the extremes take over.
It can be very dangerous. And that, you know, that's, I'm proud of that role of being able to work with my colleagues on the other side on some key pieces of legislation. It is interesting that he said, the thing that jumped out at me actually, though, was the part he put at the very end. He said, look, I am excited about being free from fundraising and worrying about 2026. And I'll be able to call balls and strikes the way I see them.
For the next 18 months, which tells me he has a plan for the next 18 months, and he is definitely not going to change his pattern of calling those balls and strikes and not going along with the White House when he feels like he can't. And that could end up being a headache for the Trump administration on other fronts. But I would say that there is one piece of this that's good news to some extent for the Trump administration, but to a greater degree for the Republican Party, and that is the timing. I mean, I think everyone would expect that the timing of this has to have something to do with the fact that President Trump came out so forcefully after Tom Tillis's vote on the big beautiful bill and said, I'm looking into Primarying Tom Tillis, and I'm going to talk to the people who are going to run against him in a primary. That, of course, now not an option.
But I think the good news for the Republican Party is that Tom Tillis didn't drag this out into the fall or even worse, into December when candidates are filing. And at that point, decide I'm not going to run. By deciding now, at the end of June, with still plenty of time for candidates to try to get into the race, get some fundraising machines, getting the big backers behind them. I think that does give Republicans enough time to coalesce around another candidate if they're able to do that. Absolutely.
I think that's one of the things that he leaves the party with and this is plenty of time and money to go and get another candidate completely prepared, run a full fair primary. And that's something that Democrats were very highly criticized for at the presidential race last time.
So I think in this case, he's like, look, if I'm going to do this, I'm going to do it right now and give my party a chance to come up with some candidates. And there's already been a lot of names flying. Pat Harrigan, Congressman Harrigan's name has been brought up. We saw an interesting tweet from even from Luke Farley, the labor commissioner, saying he'd be happy to help work with selecting some good candidates for this.
So it is, I think you're absolutely right. The timing of this is critical for the health of the Republican Party in trying to keep that seat. Jason Simmons, chairman of the NCGOP, tweeted or put a post out today saying that he feels confident that the Republicans will be able to hold on to that Senate seat in 2026, and he wished Tillis the best in his retirement. We'll continue the discussion with Mitch Kokai of the John Locke Foundation and Donna King, the editor-in-chief of CarolinaJournal.com, coming up here. It's now 5.30 on the Carolina Journal News Hour, News Talk 1110, 99.3 WBT.
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Granger for the ones who get it done. It's 5:37. Welcome back to the Carolina Journal News Hour. News Talk 1110-993 WBT. I'm Nick Craig.
Good Monday morning to you.
The massive political news over the weekend. The announcement from Republican Senator U.S. Senator Tom Tillis that he will officially not be seeking re-election. He ended his statement on Sunday by saying, As many of my colleagues have noticed over the last year and at times even joked about, I haven't exactly been excited about running for another term. This is true since the choice between spending another six years navigating the political theater in partisan gridlock in Washington or spending that time with the love of my life, Susan, our two children, and three beautiful grandchildren, as well as the rest of our extended family back home.
It's not a hard choice, and I will not be seeking. Re-election. With that, statewide candidate filing for the primary election will begin at noon on Monday, December the 1st of this year and end at noon on Friday, December the 19th, coming up later this year. The primary itself is scheduled for March the 3rd, 2026. And on Sunday afternoon, the chairman of the North Carolina Republican Party, Jason Simmons, said, quote, Senator Tillis has announced his decision to not seek re-election, and we wish him well in his retirement from public service.
As we move forward into the midterms, we will hold this seat for Republicans in 2026 and continue to deliver on President Trump's America First Priorities. In the meantime, Tillis has a remaining 18 months in office representing North Carolina. As you just heard from Mitch Coke and Donna King, Senator Tillis saying, quote, I look forward to having Having the pure freedom to call balls and strikes as I see fit and representing the great people of North Carolina to the best of my ability. All of this coming to a head earlier in the weekend, Saturday afternoon, as Senator Tillis found himself alone with just one other Republican, Senator Rand Paula, out of Kentucky, in rejecting procedural votes over the big beautiful bill. I'll note that after yesterday afternoon and Throughout most of the day yesterday, clerks in the United States Senate reading more than 930 pages of the bill out loud.
A vote is officially expected on this piece of legislation coming up over the next couple of hours this morning. Senator Tillis did, in fact, speak on the floor of the United States Senate last night about this legislation. We'll get to those comments coming up here in just a couple of minutes. But before that, this brings forth the question as to who Republicans in the state of North Carolina will coalesce behind as we move into that very busy primary season, which really got a big jumpstart yesterday. We'll continue that discussion with Mitch Coke of the John Locke Foundation and Donna King, the editor-in-chief of CarolinaJournal.com.
You mentioned the possibility of Pat Harrigan, a new member of Congress. I've also seen another new member of Congress's name, Brad Knott, the chairman of the National Republican Party, who was a former Republican Party chairman in North Carolina, Michael Watley. We've seen his name, some others that are coming out. I think one thing that is a challenge for North Carolina is, unlike on the Democratic side, where you say, The big kahuna out there is Roy Cooper. And if he gets in, that's going to be great news for Democrats.
You don't have someone on the Republican side who is that equivalent. There's not someone who you look to and say, Tillis isn't running. We've got to get candidate X. There are a number of people out there who could be potentially good candidates, but none of them who already have the built-in fundraising base that have the high name recognition and high favorability among Republicans.
So while it's helpful for them that Tom Tillis made this decision now, It is going to be difficult. For them to Fairly quickly get someone else who's the new candidate. And a big challenge that we often see for Republicans is that you don't see as much among Democrats is rallying around one candidate and saying, This is our guy or our gal, and now let's push that person. You often see Republicans have three or four different credible candidates jump in, fight among each other, and then they're damaged and bruised at the end of the primary season. I'm guessing everyone would like to avoid that this time if they can.
I would think so. Damaged, bruised, and broke. I mean, I mean, that's really what we see all the time. Republicans have a very much everybody in the pool strategy for primaries. Democrats are really good at clearing the field for their chosen candidate so that the money remains very focused on the general election.
But you're right, we're seeing lots of names. We're only seeing just a handful out of the Democrat side because Governor Cooper is so strong, so well-known, and such a strong fundraiser. On the Republican side, I think that there's a wide range of potential candidates for this who could emerge through this process. But you're right, there's not one outstanding. I've heard Aaron Parre's name pop up, a few others.
But there are a lot of young Republicans who are interested in a seat like this. And truth be told, I really think that this probably has started well before today. A lot of folks starting to investigate. Trying to primary Tillis. I think we're going to see more of that.
We've got two candidates that are declared, neither of which have strong name recognition so far, but I think we're going to see a lot more in the coming weeks.
Well, and it's certainly a different ballgame for the Republicans now because even if you thought Tom Tillis was not the right person for the job, and if you thought that it would be hard for him to win a general election in 2026, it is tough for a Republican who wants to be a loyal Republican to primary an incumbent, two-term member of the Senate.
Now, with Tillis taking himself out of this, this certainly makes it easier for someone who might be interested in this race to get in there without having the downside of being involved in a primary of trying to knock out a sitting incumbent. Sure, sure. And there's going to be a lot of national attention on this race. I mean, you're going to see a lot of national Republican groups try to come in and pad the coffers of some of the fundraising efforts of any new candidate because Tillis's race was the most expensive in the country, I believe, two cycles in a row.
So they're used to pouring a lot of money into this one. And now that they've gotten a lot more runway to get those candidates vetted and really do the background and those kind of things and get that fundraising numbers up, I think we'll see this is going to be a really closely watched race nationally. As we wrap this up, Donna, what are going to be the things that you and your staff at Carolina Journal are going to be following very closely as we move forward? Certainly, any emerging candidates, primary candidates, and also what's the reaction from the base? Because what we're really seeing over the last week or two, and really even the last month, was some criticism of Tillis, but he's also been a powerful, influential senator for North Carolina.
And what's next for him? He says it's family and grandchildren, but I just find it hard to believe that we can really count him out because he's been so influential for 25 years here in North Carolina. Very much so. Donna King is the editor-in-chief of Carolina Journal, Executive Vice President of the John Locke Foundation. You can follow all of the coverage of the Tom Tillis story and the U.S.
Senate 2026 race that just had this new major development at CarolinaJournal.com. Donna, thanks so much. Thank you.
Some great analysis there this morning from Mitch Kokai of the John Locke Foundation and Donna King of CarolinaJournal.com. We'll continue the discussion on this Monday morning edition of the Carolina Journal News Hour. It is Ryan Seacrest here. There was a recent social media trend, which consisted of flying on a plane with no music, no movies, no entertainment. But a better trend would be going to chumba casino.com.
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It's 5:51. Welcome back to the Carolina Journal News Hour. News Talk 11:10, 99.3 WBT. Of course, our big political news over the weekend. U.S.
Senator Tom Tillis announcing that he officially will not run for re-election, leaving an open primary here across the state of North Carolina. The senator falling in some hot water over the weekend, being scorched by President Donald Trump over his lack of a procedural vote over the big beautiful bill Saturday evening in the United States Senate. Last night, around 8 o'clock or so, Senator Tillis made his way to the floor of the Senate once again to explain to the citizens of North Carolina and his fellow colleagues as to why he was not in favor of that legislation. Here's Senator Tillis last night. Thank you, Mr.
President. Mr. President, I come today to explain my vote yesterday for voting against the motion to proceed on this bill. Mr. President, I spent most of my career in management consulting, managing large, complex enterprise projects, multi-year, thousands of hours, a lot of complexity that take people, process, and technology to make it work.
I learned a lot in that career. And I was able to go to the legislature and take that mindset. As a Member of the minority for two terms. And then we got a majority in 2010. And I found myself being the Speaker of the House.
mister President, we were in the middle of the financial crisis. When I got sworn in in January of twenty eleven, North Carolina had a two billion dollar shortfall on a twenty billion dollar general revenue fund. And I had six months to balance that budget.
Well, Mr. President, we did something that had not been done in North Carolina. We took the time to understand every aspect and every dollar that was being spent in government. We determined how to cut government in a way that was sustainable. We cut 12 percent.
from the university system budget. Not the rate of growth. But the actual spending. And I had some people say that it was going to be disruptive, and the University of North Carolina would never be the same again. But, Mr.
President, we did it in a way. that was instructed by the operations of the university system. And we did it in a way in concert with the chancellors. And you know what happened, Mr. President?
We actually balanced the budget. We did do those cuts. And the last time I checked, the North Carolina University System is still considered one of the greatest systems in the United States of America. Why do I use that example? Because The Medicaid proposal in this bill bears no resemblance to that kind of discipline and due diligence.
It has no insights into how these provider tax cuts are going to be absorbed without harming people on Medicare. And even worse, most of my colleagues do not even understand on either side of the aisle the interplay of state-directed payments and the devastating consequences of the funding flows that are going to be before us. Here's how I figured out the impact in North Carolina. I used to be Speaker of the House, and I like the Speaker and have a good relationship with the Speaker and the President pro tem, so I called them up. And I had my staff ask them if they would do an economic impact assessment on what this proposed bill would do to the Medicaid program in North Carolina.
But I didn't want just the view of the Republican partisan staff that reports to the Speaker and the President pro tim on how they're going to absorb. This uh This bill I decided to go to Josh Stein, the governor, and I went to his Democrat staff for Medicaid. I asked them to prepare an estimate, independent of the estimate that I had done with fiscal research. But I took a step further, Mr. President.
I went to the Hospital Association. I asked three different independent groups. A partisan Democrat group, a partisan Republican group of experts, and a nonpartisan group of the Hospital Association to develop an impact assessment independent, not talking, not sharing, reporting to me. And what I found is the best case scenario is about a $26 billion cut.
Now we've got a delay, so it may be two years, it may be one year. All it does is make that $26 billion happen in year one or year 12, but the impact is the same, Mr. President. And it's indisputable.
Now, when I actually presented this report that you can find on my website. I had people in the administration say, You're all wet, you don't know what you're doing. I said, well, why don't we assemble a series of meetings? We're going to provide you our analytics. You go through it, tear it apart.
Mr. And I told about Mehmed Oz, who I consider to be one of the most capable people in the Trump administration. He's a brilliant man, and I encourage my Democrat colleagues to talk to him. He knows his stuff. And he's very focused on getting efficiencies out of CMS.
So we had three different conference calls with CMS, with Oz on the phone and on the video, and me on the video. And I said this, guys, I would love nothing more than you to prove me wrong. That's Senator Tillis on the Senate floor last night talking about why he's, in fact, not voting and did not vote for the procedural vote Saturday on the big, beautiful bill being pushed by President Donald Trump and Republicans in both the House and the Senate. Complaints and concerns over Medicaid expansion here in North Carolina that did happen back a couple of years ago, adding more than 600,000 individuals to the Medicaid roles across the state. That is the senator's holdup.
And again, all of this culminating last night, yesterday afternoon, when Senator Tillis announced that he was officially not running for reelection, leaving an open primary here in North Carolina. There is going to be a lot of news to track on this over the coming weeks and months as we head closer to the end of the year and the May or March primary coming up early next year. Continued coverage this morning over on our website, CarolinaJournal.com. That's going to do it for a Monday edition. WBT.
News is next, followed by Good Morning BT. We're back with you tomorrow morning, 5 to 6, right here on News Talk 11.10 and 99.3 WBT.
