Our view: Hagan the pick in pivotal Senate race

North Carolina's U.S. Senate race is shaping up as the most expensive in history. Ads have been flooding the airwaves for months and there is no sign of any let-up. Republicans are convinced they can unseat Democrat Kay Hagan en route to control of the Senate.

We feel Hagan has served capably and the Citizen-Times recommends she be re-elected.

Hagan's record can be best characterized as centrist, no matter what her foes may say. She sees jobs as the No. 1 issue. She told the Citizen-Times Editorial Board she is especially concerned about the "huge lack of jobs" in rural areas.

She cites her introduction of the now-enacted AMERICA Works Act "to close the 'skills gap' by creating industry-recognized, nationally portable credentials in a range of industries." She favors an increase in the minimum wage to $10.10 an hour.

Hagan "supports education efforts to increase flexibility at the local level so that those closest to our students can make the best decisions." She introduced the School Turnaround and Rewards (STAR) Act to implement intensive turnaround models in failing schools and reward those schools that have demonstrated real improvement.

We will note that Hagan has yet to write a bill that has passed the Senate and House and gone to the president's desk for approval. Parts of measures she has authored have been folded into other pieces of legislation that have passed. She can't tout a major piece of legislation under her name; given the dysfuncational Congress we're saddled with, that isn't a surprise.

The senator stresses that "ISIS is evil." She supports humanitarian aid but says "we need to look at congressional authorization if we are to re-engage," by which she means using ground troops.

On energy, she favors an "all of the above" approach, which includes support for the Keystone pipeline. She stresses, however, that we must protect the environment and use good science.

She had steered a middle course on immigration, supporting reform but opposing amnesty.

One of the GOP's major efforts, as it has been in other states, is to tie Hagan to President Obama, hoping that the president's unpopularity will tarnish her image. In one debate, GOP nominee Thom Tillis said, "If President Obama likes it, Sen. Hagan likes it."

The Republican nominee is speaker of the state House of Representatives. Not surprisingly, much of Hagan's strategy has been to attack the GOP on state issues ranging from education to the environment to voter rights.

What Tillis calls turning "conservative principles into real reform of state policy," she decried as "cutting education, killing the equal-pay bill, making college more expensive and turning away health care for 500,000 North Carolinians."

Tillis is intelligent, and it could be argued in his defense that as speaker he was walking a tightrope due to sharp differences in his caucus. Still, his policies would be harmful to the nation's working people. He opposes an increase in the minimum wage, insisting it will cost jobs despite the fact that previous increases did not. He insists that the way for government to create jobs is to get out of the way, another claim not supported by history.

He supports the balanced-budget gimmick and makes the preposterous claim that the Affordable Care Act "is a cancer on our national economy." He is continuing his fight against same-sex marriage by wasting state money on a meaningless appeal.

Although Tillis has met with our editorial board in the past, attempts to schedule an interview for the 2014 Senate election were unsuccessful. That, however, is not why we recommend Hagan. Our views are based on her record. And his.