Kinston Free Press: Hagan takes the lead

Kinston Free Press
David Anderson
September 24, 2008

Democrat Kay Hagan has spent nearly a year blitzing the entire state in an effort to unseat incumbent U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Dole, R-N.C., and the effort is now paying off.

Hagan, who has spent 10 years representing Guilford County in the N.C. Senate, faced a major challenge when she kicked off her campaign last November. She first had to win a five-way Democratic primary, and then take on a well-known incumbent senator with decades of experience in Washington, D.C.

Polls released this summer showed Dole ahead of Hagan by “double digits,” according to the polling firm Rasmussen Reports’ Web site.

A Rasmussen telephone poll of 500 voters taken Sept. 18 showed Hagan ahead 51-45 percent, though.

Dole, who was elected to her seat in 2002, is the wife of Bob Dole, who spent nearly 30 years in the Senate himself, representing Kansas.

Elizabeth Dole has also served as the U.S. Secretary of Transportation and Labor, and as a White House staffer under President Ronald Regan.

“Elizabeth Dole is a public servant in the truest sense of the term,” her campaign Web site states.

Hagan’s strategy against Dole has been one of tying her to the currently unpopular President George W. Bush, claiming Dole votes in support of his policies 92 percent of the time.

Hagan has also painted Dole as being unresponsive to her constituents’ needs, dubbing her “Senator Nowhere in North Carolina.”

“She hasn’t done anything (in Washington),” Hagan said of Dole during a break in her three public appearances in Greene and Lenoir counties on Wednesday. “I do have a strong record in Raleigh, and I’m proud of it.”

Colleen Flanagan, Hagan’s communications director, said staffers have worked tirelessly to get their candidate to as many public appearances in as many places as possible and have waged an aggressive media campaign.

“When you’re competing with Elizabeth Dole, who has much higher name recognition, the onus has been on us to get Kay out there,” Flanagan explained.

She added: “Kay’s in an extremely competitive race with a woman whose last name is Dole and who’s been in Washington for 40 years.”

The Hagan strategy with voters has been to make grass roots appearances in large and small communities. Citizens have a chance to meet her face-to-face and listen to someone who understands that the “country is going in the wrong direction,” Flanagan said.

At the same time, Hagan gives voters ways in which she would handle issues with health care, energy policy, the war and the economy.

“Folks, I don’t think, respond really well when you say, ‘Yeah, we are going in the wrong direction, I agree, period,’ “ Flanagan explained. “That’s why Kay’s been traveling across the state saying, ‘You’re right we’re going in the wrong direction; here’s my ideas to turn this back around.’ “

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