Sort of against the Department of Education
Published August 14, 2014
by Doug Clark, Greensboro News-Record, August 13, 2014.
“It’s clear from his comments that he didn’t say he would eliminate the Department of Education," Jordan Shaw, campaign manager for Republican Senate candidate Thom Tillis, said Tuesday in response to barbs by Democratic Sen. Kay Hagan.
Shaw is half right. Tillis did not say during a Republican primary debate that he would work to eliminate the U.S. Department of Education if elected.
But he was far from clear about it.
It sounded as if he wanted his Republican audience to think he said he would do so without explicitly saying so, allowing him to deny it later.
Don't forget, his principal rival, Greg Brannon, advocated for cutting back the federal government to its original scope, doing away with anything not specifically established in the Constitution.
The Republican base in North Carolina is so far to the right, Tillis didn't want to give any ground.
As Joe Killian reports:
"During the Republican debate, candidates were asked by an audience member what federal department they would actively campaign to eliminate and why.
"Tillis said: 'I think going back to Common Core, I’d start looking at the Department of Education. We existed for more than a century without one, and now what we have are bureaucrats in the Department of Education that make on average $102,000 per year. They’ve created rules. They’ve reduced the options that teachers have to actually teach the children. They’re forcing teachers to spend more time preparing reports than actually intervening with children and educating them.
“'So I think that’s probably the first department I’d look at, but I don’t know that you’d stop there. But that’d be the first priority when I become senator — clawing back the regulations and at some point wonder whether it even needs to exist in its current form.'”
Certainly Tillis knows that the Department of Education is here to stay. It was given Cabinet-level status in 1979 and has existed in its current form through 20 years of Republican administrations. Calling for its demise, or appearing to, might win some points in a Republican debate but would not get him anywhere in a general election campaign.
Tillis will moderate some of his positions because it's necessary to appeal to a broader electorate.
Similarly, Hagan is touting her ranking as "most moderate" senator by National Journal.
The middle ground is critical in this election.
The middle in North Carolina politics supports public education, and Hagan is smart to hit on that issue because many voters aren't happy with the direction that Tillis and the GOP state legislature have taken -- recent teacher pay raise or not.
