Democrat Cal Cunningham Blames Sen. Thom Tillis for Affair Scandal as Campaign Implodes
Cunningham: Tillis “has now resorted to trying to make this campaign about something other than the issues. But we know, I know, this campaign is about your hopes and your dreams.”
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The month of October keeps going from bad to worse for North Carolina Democratic Senate nominee Cal Cunningham, and we’re barely into the first week of it.
To recap for everyone how bad things have gotten for him, let’s do a quick day-by-day rundown of what’s happened so far before we get into the latest developments:
Thursday: News broke of the “sexting” relationship involving Army veteran Cunningham, who is married and has two teenage children, and California consultant Arlene Guzman Todd — whose husband is also an Army veteran.
Friday: After his campaign confirmed the texts first reported by NationalFile.com were genuine, Cunningham issued a statement Friday night apologizing for what happened, and said he would stay in the race. At that point, the belief was that the sexting was just sexting and nothing beyond that.
Saturday/Sunday: Cunningham’s campaign and social media feeds go dark. His Facebook ads get scaled way back.
Monday: At the last minute, Cunningham backed out of a scheduled town hall with no explanation. It just so happened that on the day of the town hall, he was hit with another explosive allegation, this time from a former member of his state Senate steering committee who claimed in a Facebook comment that a friend of hers had been having an affair with Cunningham since 2012.
Tuesday: Though the second alleged affair has not been confirmed nor denied, the Associated Press spoke to his sexting partner Guzman Todd herself and confirmed she and Cunningham took their relationship to the next level (ahem) by conducting an intimate affair out of his home as late as July of this year.
Wednesday: Raleigh-based WRAL reported that the Army Reserve was opening an investigation into Cunningham. The report also noted that “Adultery is listed as ‘unacceptable conduct’ by the military and maybe ‘service discrediting.’”
A local reporter from CBS 17 happened to catch Cunningham out and about Wednesday morning and interviewed him about the scandal. Cunningham, who also had mask issues during the interview, repeatedly refused to answer questions about the matter, claiming the campaign was “not about my personal life”:
“This campaign is not about my personal life” is absolutely not a sustainable answer from now until November.
Speaks volumes about how arrogant this guy is if he thinks voters don’t deserve answers about his conduct and judgment. pic.twitter.com/Bvx8624qVt #ncsen #ncpol
— Jack Pandol (@jackpandol) October 7, 2020
Wednesday night during a virtual event for a North Carolina environmental group, Cunningham bizarrely seemed to blame his opponent, Sen. Thom Tillis, for the affair scandal:
“Because Thom Tillis knows that he is losing and knows that we are winning, he has now resorted to trying to make this campaign about something other than the issues. But we know, I know, this campaign is about your hopes and your dreams,” he said.
NEW: Cal Cunningham is blaming SENATOR TILLIS for his sexting scandal pic.twitter.com/pZah66zOsm
— Chris Martin (@chrisjdmartin) October 8, 2020
That’s a laughably absurd claim. This scandal broke Thursday, and Tillis himself, who tested positive for the Wuhan Coronavirus on Friday, did not even comment on it until Tuesday, saying Cunningham owed North Carolina voters a “full and thorough explanation.”
And now that he has, the campaign has gone full steam ahead with an ad blasting Cunningham for his conduct and touching on the military aspect. The ad ends with a video clip of Tillis walking hand and hand with his wife, Susan Tillis:
Chuck Schumer has spent over $80 million trying to paint one picture of Cal Cunningham, but North Carolinians are now realizing it was all one big lie and that Cunningham's candidacy is riddled with hypocrisy.
Watch our new ad here -> pic.twitter.com/JImz4lcgAe
— Thom Tillis (@ThomTillis) October 8, 2020
That is flat brutal and makes some solid points – mainly that Cunningham has brought this all on himself.
I’ve had many people asking me how much, if any, this has changed the course of this key Senate race, considering polls up until last week showed Cunningham in the lead.
I sense that the tide has turned against Cunningham, perhaps not by a ton but maybe by just enough that Tillis can really capitalize on the scandal and move undecided, independent, and conservative Democrat voters in his direction. Only two polls have been taken since the scandal broke, with one from a Democrat pollster showing no change and another showing Tillis up by one. Cook Political still ranks the race as a “toss-up.”
But if this continues to drag out as it has for the last week, it is bound to take effect in polling at some point.
There’s also a sense of déjà vu here, not just because of the comparisons to John Edwards but also because in 2014, when Tillis ran against Sen. Kay Hagan (D), he was down in the polls then as well. Still, some negative stories about Hagan in October changed the direction of that race towards the end, and he ended up winning it in an election-night nailbiter.
Cunningham claiming this campaign is not about his personal life is a real knee-slapper, and here’s why:
From the start, Cunningham has run an Andy Griffith “family guy, character matters, man of honor” campaign, the type you typically see from politicians in the South. He frequently mentions his time served in Iraq and Afghanistan. Some of his campaign ads even end with him saying, “in North Carolina, the truth still matters.”
He’s framed his whole campaign around his upstanding character, devotion to his family and the military, how the truth matters, etc. He doesn’t get to suddenly dial it back when it’s inconvenient to his political ambitions.
He’s had at least one affair, possibly two, going on while running a campaign based on the family/military man persona in a state that is not only home to Fort Bragg and other military installations but which also is still deeply religious.
This is going to end up negatively impacting him, even if the polling doesn’t reflect it. How much it does is the million-dollar question and one we won’t have an answer to until November 3rd.
— Stacey Matthews has also written under the pseudonym “Sister Toldjah” and can be reached via Twitter. —
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Comments
What are the issues that are so important? Whether Trump and Stormy Daniels were a pair? Yet I never heard this supposedly moral person stand up and say to cease and desist. Similarly, no criticism that Biden should cease and desist his behavior.
So I guess immoral behavior only is important when Republicans are doing it. Next, he’ll tell us “I never had sex with that woman” that women who he raped were “trailer trash” and that he is headed back to do “the people’s work” just like another D who (successfully) claimed that it was not his personal moral behavior, it was how many babies he could kill a year.
A commissioned Officer fooling around with an enlisted mans wife….Not Good!!!!
In a statement demanding Cunningham drop out of the race Jeremy Todd, husband of Cal’s side squeeze Arlene Gutzman Todd, referred to himself as a junior officer.
The low-IQ MFM can’t even get simple things about the armed forces right. So who knows? But in any case senior officers can’t bang their subordinates’ wives and get away with it scot free. Particularly COs, XOs, or JAGS, all of whom know better. And many of whom don’t act like it.
At some point during the Navy’s Prospective CO and XO indoctrination course the Admiral in charge will come in and tell these officers to look around. Then the admiral will tell them that something like 1/4 to 1/3 will be relieved before their first command/XO tour is up. And the reason will be either drinking or sex.
I’ve come across news that the Army Reserve is investigating Cal Thomas (I guess that’s Tillis’ doing, too). I doubt he’ll be prosecuted under article 134 of the UCMJ. But they can’t let this go now that Cal decided to make himself famous in a way that heaps discredit on the Army. There’s no way he can continue to function as a JAG officer.
Either he’ll have to retire or his reporting seniors will rip him a new one in every officer fitness report from now until he fails to promote to full Colonel.
Unless of course he wins and Biden wins. Biden will make this go away like he made that Ukrainian prosecutor investigating rampant corruption at Hunter’s oil and gas company go away.
Arminius,
Agreed. Most likely outcome is non judicial administrative actions.
1. His next performance evaluation will be a hoot.
2. Letter of reprimand into his open file.
These two things will be enough to end his reserve career. As to his retirement, he might qualify but only in the ‘last grade held with suitable performance’. So if he is currently a LTC then he would be retiring as a MAJ. If he was engaged in these acts back to 2012 as alleged then if he was a senior CPT he could be looking at retiring as a 1LT.
That’s a heck of a drop in pay from 05 down to 02. Not to mention if the Reserves want to play very mean they can strip his awards and decorations for the time periods covering his affairs.
“It was Mr. Tillis’ fault” that I pulled down my pants. It was Mr. Tillis’ fault I put my dingaling in another woman. I is innocent!
Hope Schumer thinks this is $80 million well spent – hahahahaha
My 3-Parter Plus
1) His apology was sickening and depraved. Only a masochistic fool would accept it; anyway, forgiveness is for the emotional benefit of the aggrieved, I get it.
2) Just like so many of us got Joe’s Jillie and her agenda all wrong, maybe we’re now also getting Cal’s mate reckoned upside-down as well in that it might actually have been her idea to blame Tom for her (poor excuse of a good) husband (and leader of a brigade of soldiers)’s personal and professional misconduct after forgiving the lying, ungrateful sociopath she knows best (certainly better than all the rest of his sucker-sector of NC constituents).
3) The proud and loving couple at hand will eventually get the hang of it (again, ahem) once they settle down, focus, and channel their inner Michigan Governor’s spirit, particularly Her Excellency’s brazen, unmitigated chutzpah by taking their victimology to the ultimate political level and — you guessed it! — blaming this angst-and-heartache-resulting fall in character and social status, this intramarital storm and stress induced by — yes indeed! — the rants and raves, my God, all the post-infective prevarications and disobediences to our Constitution committed by the CIC, PDJT!
And, just as in other recent cases of Demo-Communist misconduct, all will be okay, and maybe even triumphant in the end.
To misalign intent and object, to misjudge and grievously err is human; to foolishly overlook the sinner, forgive him/her, and still manage to find a political advantage in the sordid mix is perversely and corruptly human — a/k/a being an unfailing and loyal Democrat supporter.
It’s a freak thing, you see: it’s what they do and, thus, it’s who they are, and it’s certainly what they feel they deserve and no better. They’re all Cal today.
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