Tillis Blasts Democratic Opponents For Supporting Socialist Bernie Sanders
February 14th, 2020
Cunningham And Smith Both Vow To Back Whoever Democrats Nominate For President
CHARLOTTE, N.C. – During a press conference today after casting his vote in the 2020 primary, Senator Thom Tillis blasted his Democratic opponents Cal Cunningham and Erica Smith for vowing to back their party’s nominee for president – even if its socialist Bernie Sanders.
Tillis said during his press conference, “If Erica Smith believes people in North Carolina, and if Cal Cunningham believes people in North Carolina want Bernie Sanders and his liberal, progressive policies in place, then they need to be informed about it…When people in North Carolina see that the health care that they get on their job could potentially be taken away with Medicare for All, when they see that the Green New Deal is going to create a fiscal disaster, it’s going to kill jobs, it’s going to have to require taxes to be raised, then they will be soundly rejected in North Carolina.”
The embrace that Smith and Cunningham are showing for Sanders’ candidacy is at odds with longtime North Carolina Democratic Congressman GK Butterfield, who says a Sanders nomination will “damage the down ballot races” in North Carolina.
A full transcript of Tillis’ opening remarks to the media today after voting can be found below.
TRANSCRIPT
I just came back from Early Voting. My wife and I cast our ballots for President Trump and for my re-election.
The main reason I’m doing it is the reason that I ran in 2014. We had a country that was going in the wrong direction, we had unemployment that was unacceptable, a tax environment that was not allowing us to grow jobs and realize our economy’s full potential, trade that needed to get done, and over the past 5 years, along with the President’s help 3.5 years ago, we’ve made a huge change.
Now, we’ve got record low unemployment, we’ve made progress on trade, we’re seeing job creation at record numbers, minority employment at record numbers for female, African American, Asian, and Hispanic populations. More job creation than we’ve seen in decades. We’ve got to continue it.
Right down the road in Charlotte this afternoon, we’re going to hear from Bernie Sanders. We’re going to hear about the Green New Deal, Medicare-for-All, open borders, a focus away from funding the military, and those are all things that the American people and people in North Carolina are simply going to reject.
The age-old question when you vote is – are you better off now than you were four years ago? And there is no question that the answer to that is yes. We need to get President Trump re-elected, we need to keep the majority in the Senate so that we can continue to fulfill the promises that we have, and with my tenure in the Senate and with the President’s help, we’re going to make the great results that we’ve seen, even greater in the next cycle in his second term.
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Read the Raleigh News & Observer’s full article on the impact a Sanders nomination would have on North Carolina Democrats down the ballot HERE.
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