'Tillis is a coward': Angry voters hurl demands as NC senator kicks off reelection bid

Brandon Kingdollar, NC Newsline
23 March
Anderson Clayton called on the audience of several hundred at Raleigh Brewing Company to remember that their vote matters.

While North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis began fundraising for his 2026 reelection campaign at the Carolina Country Club Friday morning, more than 100 protesters demanded he meet with them for a town hall.

That evening, hundreds more gathered at the Raleigh Brewing Company for an “empty chair town hall,” where voters voiced their frustrations to a chair used as a Tillis stand-in.

As frustrations mount over Elon Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) and the rising count of federal programs that have become its casualties, Tillis is preparing for what may be the most contentious Senate race in the country next year, coming under fire from both his left and right flanks.

So far, Tillis has toed the party line, voting for all of President Donald Trump’s cabinet nominees. Even as he privately lobbied the former sister-in-law of Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth to come forward with abuse allegations — promising it would convince senators to oppose his nomination, the Wall Street Journal reported — he ultimately provided the crucial 50th vote in favor himself.

In nearly 10 years in the Senate, Tillis has not held an in-person town hall. A fellow North Carolinian, Republican U.S. Rep. Richard Hudson told colleagues to stop holding them earlier this month, according to Politico, with GOP leaders dismissing angry voters as “professional protesters.”

Voters at Friday’s events described calling, texting, and emailing his office, as well as meeting with his staff and sharing their concerns. All said they were dissatisfied with the responses they received, describing them as formulaic and not specific to the issues they raised. But as pressure on Tillis continues to rise, many of the North Carolinians who spoke out Friday said they believe he will feel the heat and hear them out — or face the consequences at the ballot box.

Tillis’s office did not respond to multiple requests for comment on this story.

A fundraiser protest

About 110 North Carolinians lined up across the street from the Carolina Country Club Friday, as Tillis hosted a “campaign kick-off luncheon” featuring state and federal Republican lawmakers and prolific fundraisers.

The group of demonstrators, which included federal workers and veterans, chanted “Thom Tillis sucks,” “Tillis is a coward,” and “Get a spine or resign!” They held up signs that branded him as “Country Club Tillis” and denounced Trump, Musk, and DOGE. Some of the cars streaming down Glenwood Avenue honked in support, including a Tesla, as the demonstrators cheered for the approval.

Kelly Keating, president of the American Federation of Government Employees Local 2065, said she came out to demand Tillis “honor his oath” as his constituents lose their livelihoods. She noted that roughly a third of federal workers are veterans, and by gutting federal agencies, the administration is simultaneously “decimating” their hospitals and eliminating their jobs.

“He needs to have a town hall so that people can communicate with him,” Keating said. “Our people have called several times, but they’re not getting any kind of responses back.”

The protest was organized by the Triangle Labor Council, which demonstrated against federal worker firings and Social Security office closures at Raleigh’s Terry Sanford Federal Building earlier this month. But the event drew a large number of North Carolinians dissatisfied with Tillis beyond the federal workforce, including veterans and workers in related fields.

Dave Smith, who served in the North Carolina Army National Guard, said he’s reached out to Tillis with concerns about the cuts to veterans’ services, but received nothing but “boilerplate” responses. He said he was especially galled by Tillis’s vote for Hegseth, calling the Defense Secretary a “disastrously unqualified choice.”

“He talked a good game, but then when it came time, rubber meet the road, he tucked his tail and caved,” Smith said. “Our nation, our national security is suffering because of that.”

Mike Senn, a software engineer in Raleigh who attended both Tillis protests Friday, said he has been calling the senator once a week since Trump’s inauguration to share his concerns, but every time, it goes straight to voicemail.

“I’m calling to get attention from him, to tell him to pick up the phone, to tell him to listen to his constituents and to hold a town hall with his constituents here in North Carolina,” Senn said.

A veteran’s daughter, Audrey Fischer said she showed up Friday to demand Tillis hear the human impact of the federal cuts he has supported. Fischer, who volunteers with the Wilson County Democratic Party, expressed outrage that the Trump administration is interfering with veterans’ benefits as well as Medicaid programs and labor protections.

“Sometimes you are able to get through to a person by showing that their constituents do not believe in the policies that they are pushing, do not believe in platforming billionaires over workers,” Fischer said. “Sometimes, it’s also to show that there are other people in your neighborhood who believe the same as you.”

She noted that bus drivers and truckers were among those who honked in support of the protest, which she said is evidence that anger over the DOGE cuts are emerging across social and economic lines.

“If we show them what are beliefs are, that anyone can participate, everyone is needed,” Fischer said, “we want them to come to our side and see the light of day and see that we can be stronger together.”

An ‘empty chair’ town hall

Six hours later and an 11-minute drive west of Tillis’ fundraiser at the Carolina Country Club, hundreds of his constituents packed into the Raleigh Brewing Company for the chance to demand answers of a stand-in for the senator: a stuffed chicken.

The event, organized by the Triangle Area Indivisible Collaborative, brought together state Democratic Party figures and disaffected voters in an effort to pressure Tillis to hear their concerns directly. It drew around 700 North Carolinians who wanted to make their voices heard, about 200 of whom packed into the brewery’s main hall to hear speakers. Some held signs, including one that read “Tillis Do Your Job” and another that depicted the senator’s head on the body of a chicken.

Jake and Aden Kalinowski spoke about their seven-year-old sister Evelyn, who was born with a rare genetic disorder known as dup15q syndrome that causes chronic seizures. Her treatment, they said, is only possible because of Medicaid coverage that is now in jeopardy because of cuts to federal funding by the Trump administration and Congress.

Aden Kalinowski, 21, told the crowd that while less than a year ago, he wanted nothing to do with politics, after seeing his sister put at risk, he realized he did not have a choice but to speak up.

“Even though she can’t walk or talk or even say to me my name, she has given me so much love and so much of everything that I am as a man and a brother,” he said. “Why do people like her have to get her medicine taken away, or get her physical therapy taken away, or get her everything taken away — her equipment, her school — for what? For more money in billionaires’ pockets? I will never understand it.”

Jake Kalinowski, 23, choking back tears, thanked the crowd for showing up to stand up for his sister and others in need.

“It really breaks my heart to know that, if she loses the support she has, that something may happen to her and I may not see her again. And I don’t understand why people like you can’t see that,” he said, addressing Tillis. “We need to keep fighting for people like her.”

Federal workers who spoke at the town hall denounced cuts to agencies that safeguard the environment and protect consumers as well as the Department of Education, which provides substantial funding to schools all across North Carolina.

Anna Ruderman, a pediatrician and a co-founder of Bull City Indivisible, said she met with Tillis’s staff last week and explained to them that her work, the treatment of children with complex medical issues, is “not efficient and it shouldn’t be.” She recounted the story of a young child who nearly died before being brought by CPR and who now needs speech therapy dependent on Medicaid. “It takes longer. It’s important. Their lives are important,” she said.

Also among the speakers were state Democratic politicians, including North Carolina Democratic Party Chair Anderson Clayton, former U.S. Rep. Wiley Nickel, former Commissioner of Agriculture candidate Sarah Taber, and Chapel Hill town councilor Theodore Nollert.

Nickel called for Tillis to hold a town hall, countering that he participated in 16 while he was a member of Congress. He also condemned Republican U.S. Rep. Virginia Foxx for dismissing town halls as “just an opportunity for people to yell” at their representatives. “When you decide that you’re not gonna go serve, you’re not gonna go answer questions, it’s time for you to go,” Nickel said.

He recounted how despite promising Pete Hegseth’s former sister-in-law his nomination would fail, Tillis ultimately voted to confirm him for Secretary of Defense.

“When you fold once like that — when Trump says he’s going to primary you and Elon Musk says he’s going to spend a bunch of money — you will fold every single time,” he said. “His vote is no longer for North Carolinians; it is just for Donald Trump.”

Clayton drew some of the loudest cheers of the night, as she blasted the General Assembly for working to pass a law stripping Attorney General Jeff Jackson of the power to challenge executive orders and condemned Judge Jefferson Griffin for continuing to litigate the state Supreme Court election nearly five months after he lost the final tally by 734 votes.

“Y’all need to understand that your vote means something and that is why Republicans are trying to disenfranchise it, to take it away and to make it so we don’t feel like it matters,” Clayton said. “They’re trying to steal an election, and you know what we’re going to do? Stop them.”

Richard Scott, an unaffiliated voter living in Fuquay-Varina, said after the town hall that he hopes Tillis takes the initiative to get in touch with North Carolinians about the issues that matter to them, but as a “realist,” he thinks it is unlikely the senator will be responsive. Though he has reached out to Tillis’s office several times, Scott said he has received little more than a “pat on the head.”

“I think the American people want to see less destruction and some idea that there’s a plan in the works here,” Scott said. “It’s about time that in North Carolina, we begin to realize there’s a whole lot of people that aren’t in one party or another, and you should be listening to them.”

A challenging reelection bid

The protests foreshadow a contentious campaign ahead for Tillis, who after Susan Collins of Maine, faces the most challenging reelection battle of any Republican in the Senate.

Tillis’s close adherence to Trump’s positions, even on issues like Hegseth’s nomination where he displayed an inclination to vote the other way, suggests more concern over a primary challenge from the right than losing moderate voters in the general election.

Thus far, Tillis has drawn two Republican primary challengers, according to FEC filings — Don Brown of Charlotte, a constitutional attorney and former U.S. Navy JAG Officer, and Andy Nilsson of Winston-Salem, a businessman and former lieutenant governor candidate. Neither has garnered significant support from Republican opponents to Tillis, though Brown has ties with Hegseth and former Trump National Security Advisor Michael Flynn.

The most well-known North Carolina politician floated as a Republican primary challenger, former Lieutenant Governor Mark Robinson, has said he has no plans to run for the Senate, despite frequent criticism of Tillis on the 2024 campaign trail. But the possibility of Trump endorsing a primary opponent is a constant shadow over the senator’s reelection prospects, after a career of seeking to portray himself as a pragmatist and moderate.

According to the New York Times, Trump asked a group of North Carolina lawmakers in January whether any of them would like his support to primary Tillis ahead of a potential defection on the Hegseth vote.

At least some Republicans lawmakers in the state are withholding their support from Tillis for now. Punchbowl News reported that U.S. Representatives Pat Harrigan and Mark Harris are not endorsing Tillis at this time, and that the Tillis campaign included Harrigan as well as Rep. Addison McDowell and Rep. Brad Knott as special guests on the invitation for the Friday fundraiser without their knowledge.

On the Democratic side, Tillis may face former Gov. Roy Cooper, one of North Carolina’s most popular politicians and the architect of the state’s Medicaid expansion, though he has so far not made his plans explicit, only telling supporters “we’re not done” at a farewell rally last year. Also considering a run is Nickel, the former congressman, who has filed with the FEC as a candidate but has not yet formally launched a campaign.

In a state where a plurality of voters are unaffiliated with either political party, how Tillis allays the concerns of voters who feel the Trump administration has gone too far may be critical for his reelection bid. So far, these demonstrators say he has not done enough to stand up for the issues that matter to them.

NC Newsline is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. NC Newsline maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Rob Schofield for questions: info@ncnewsline.com.

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