getting repeated now by other republican candidates, as well as democrats in north carolina, reminding people about this scandal that surfaced, where not one, but two of tillis staffers did admit to having affairs with lobbyists, who were lobbying his office as house speaker. and even more interesting, that tillis, who is someone who is adamant about cutting unemployment benefits to north carolinians, didn t feel the same about those two staffers. and in fact, using taxpayer money, gave them nearly $20,000 in severance payments after they had to be dismissed. chris kromm from the institute for southern studies, watching what is one of the most fascinating races in the country, thank you so much. thank you. coming up right now, if you are in the middle class, it may be better for you to live in canada, sweden, norway, finlands, or the netherlands than here in the u.s., and i ll tell you why, next.
connected to this conservative government, that has become quite unpopular in the state, actually. brannon is this kind of outsider gadfly. who do you think kay hagan wants to win this primary? i think there s no doubt they would see brannon as a godsend. but it is interesting, you look at that issue about climate denial. you might expect that to be a position that s held by brannon, someone who s equated food stamps with slavery, who s said that local property taxes, he s equated them president holocaust. he s rubbed elbows with some 9/11 truthers. that s the kind of view you might expect from someone from that tea party fringe. you might expect it from heather grant, who s one of the other candidates, who believes that the second amendment extends to owning a cannon in your backyard. but tillis is supposed to be the establishment candidate, right? and so for him to be openly endorsing this position, but he has a problem. which is the fact that he also
as democrats in north carolina, reminding people about this scandal that surfaced, where not one, but two of tillis staffers did admit to having affairs with lobbyists, who were lobbying his office as house speaker. and even more interesting, that tillis, who is someone who is adamant about cutting unemployment benefits to north carolinians, didn t feel the same about those two staffers. and in fact, using taxpayer money, gave them nearly $20,000 in severance payments after they had to be dismissed. chris kromm from the institute for southern studies, watching what is one of the most fascinating races in the country, thank you so much. thank you. coming up right now, if you are in the middle class, it may be better for you to live in canada, sweden, norway, finlands, or the netherlands than here in the u.s., and i ll tell you why, next. .
revolution in north carolina. and i think what you re really seeing is it s getting to the heart of a big problem, which is that republicans in this state, they know that where the money is is to take these extreme positions on issue after issue. so denying climate science, i m sure, delighted the koch brothers, who have invested, like you said, $7 million in attacking kay hagan, and their energy industrialists billionaires. but when it comes to mainstream voters that are concerned about whether the government is serious about addressing an issue like this, there ll be more concerns when you get to the november elections. and tillis has his own problem, he has his own scandal developing. i thought i was reading this wrong, two of his aides were having affairs with lobbyists, and they were different ones. there were different marital affairs with married lobbyists, including his chief of staff. am i getting that right? that s exactly right, and that came out in 2012, but it s gettin
triangle park. but today, denial of science, especially climate science, has become a near article of faith amongst republican leaders. and i think it really starts at the top, with governor mccrory. this is a person who worked for 28 years at duke energy. he benefited from the last two campaign cycles, over $1 million in campaign contributions from duke, which is the largest utility in the world. he still owns stock in duke energy, although we re not sure how much. but that interest, that influence that you see from energy interests in the state is reflected at every level of government today, and especially, i think, you saw it in the reaction to one of the biggest coal ash disasters in the country that happened this spring, and inaction from the government, you re seeing from the state government in response to the disaster. i m really interested about the dynamics in this race, between tillis and brannon. i mean, tillis is really part of the establishment there. he s house speake