U.S. Sen. Thom Tillis said Thursday that fellow Republican Michael Whatley should be focusing more tightly on issues that North Carolina voters care about rather than criminal justice policy in an effort to win the seat Tillis holds.
Asked what those issues are, Tillis said, "Number one, affordability. Affordability is always an issue. It's not a matter of whether or not there are people who have affordability problems, it's a matter of how many."
Whatley is a former chair of the North Carolina Republican Party and the Republican National Committee who President Donald Trump tapped to run for the seat after Tillis announced he would not seek reelection. His Democratic opponent is Roy Cooper, who has spent much of his adult life in elected office including two terms as North Carolina's governor and four terms as attorney general.
In an East Carolina University poll released this month, 52.5% of respondents said they would vote for Cooper while 45.5% said they would vote for Whatley. That is one of many recent polls that has shown Cooper with a lead in the race.
The ECU pollsters also asked respondents what they considered the most important issue in the upcoming election, with 54.7% saying the economy or cost of living. By comparison, 11% said border security and 6.2% said crime or public safety.
Cooper's campaign stops are often advertised as being part of a "Make Stuff Cost Less Tour" where Cooper bemoans rising prices and highlights stories of local people who are struggling to make ends meet.
By contrast, Whatley's events have often focused on crime. When they are about economic issues, Whatley frequently says that boosting the economy is about tax policy, regulatory policy, and trade policies while offering scant specifics.
A criminal justice focus
Whatley's campaign and GOP-aligned outside groups have largely hammered Cooper on what they label soft-on-crime policies, including a COVID-19 era settlement with advocacy organizations that freed about 3,500 people from North Carolina's prisons.
The Cooper campaign has contended that he fought those releases as governor, including refusing to commute sentences during COVID-19 and reaching a settlement that severely curbed the number of potential inmate releases.
Republicans have also tried to link the releases with the stabbing death of a Ukrainian refugee on a Charlotte light rail train last year. While DeCarlos Brown, Jr., the man charged in that case, was classified as part of the settlement, he had actually already served his mandatory minimum sentence and been released before the agreement took effect.
Regardless, Tillis said Republicans' focus on crime in the race is misguided. He made the comments while speaking with reporters Thursday following remarks at a N.C. Sustainable Energy Association conference.
"if you're trying to build an argument for an issue that the data just doesn't suggest is top of mind, then I think you're wasting money and time. And you're not motivating people to come out to the (polls). You're committed to fixing a problem that many voters don't think exists," Tillis said.
A Whatley campaign spokesman did not reply to a WUNC News request for comment on Thursday.
Tillis also referenced remarks President Donald Trump made during a September campaign stop, where he called North Carolina "one of the most violent states." According to FBI data, North Carolina has the 21st-highest violent crime rate.
Republicans, Tillis noted, control the legislature, the governor's mansion or both in many of the states with the highest crime rate.
What's next for Tillis?
Tillis signed copies of his new book "How to Lose Friends and Antagonize Presidents" after speaking Thursday.
While on stage, the second-term senator said he hasn't decided exactly what his post-Senate life will look like but that he will likely rejoin the business world. Before entering politics, he was a partner at Big Four accounting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers.
But Tillis also said that he is interested in either founding or joining a group that aims to push people on the farthest left and farthest right wings of politics out of elected office.
Tillis labeled that part of an effort to support producers in politics and punish performers.
"I want them to see this organization coming so that there will be a reckoning for these people that are taking advantage of social media and the way we get their news now and they're acting like they're the great performers in state legislatures and in House chambers up in D.C. and they haven't produced anything," Tillis said.
