ATLANTA — A frequent topic in Michelle Nunn’s stump speech illustrates how her political philosophy differs from her Senate opponent, David Perdue.
“I believe, ultimately, that the way that we fight gridlock and dysfunction is to send people to Washington who are willing to work across party lines, who believe there can be good ideas on both sides of the aisle,” she often says.
Nunn, the Democratic nominee, uses the example of the latest shutdown of the federal government. Where Perdue has said the shutdown was worthwhile because the ensuing negotiations resulted in budget cutting, Nunn argues it was an unnecessary blow to ordinary Americans.
She vows to remain open-minded enough to seek bipartisan cooperation to avoid another similar showdown. And what that illustrates is her view that government can be a tool to help solve problems, which contrasts with Perdue’s notion that people will solve their own problems if government gets out of the way.
While Nunn doesn’t have Perdue’s inherent dislike of government, she does believe it can be improved, arguing for some trimming of onerous regulations and reduction of the corporate income-tax rate.
Nunn’s focus on helping people is more than a political philosophy. She spent her career doing it as the head of non-profit foundations that organize volunteers and dispense grants for various causes.
How that would translate in the Senate shows up in her stance on multiple issues. For instance, she wants to fine tune the Affordable Care Act rather than repeal it like Perdue suggests.
“I am running as someone who wants to fix the things that are broken in the health care system and build upon the things that are good, including ensuring that people who have preexisting conditions have access to health care, that kids up to age 26 have the opportunity to be covered by their parents,” she says.
She also favors pay-equity legislation, immigration reform and raising the minimum wage. She points to states that have boosted the pay threshold internally as having more vibrant economies than those like Georgia that have relied on the lower federal minimum.
“When people are looking at what we can do in Congress, it is (one option) — to make sure that everyone who is working has the capacity to be self-sufficient,” she said.
Perdue, who disagrees, says her position proves her background doesn’t prepare her for the Senate.
“This is a perfect example of what happens when somebody who’s never really been in business tries to start answering questions about how do you grow jobs,” he said in a debate last month, adding that a wage hike would cost the jobs of one-third of those earning it.
Nunn counters that it doesn’t take a career in business to understand economics. However, another economics topic has brought outside attacks on her, the Fair Tax.
It’s a proposal, originated by former Rep. John Linder, R-Ga., to replace federal income taxes with a national sales tax, making so-called “pre-bates” of cash to those with the lowest income as compensation.
“The Fair Tax would mean a 30-percent-plus tax on things like milk, groceries, everything,” she said in the debate. “It would also mean that more than 50 percent of Georgians would end up paying $4,000 more in taxes. Now people at the very top, the top 1 percent, would be paying less.”
Instead, she favors revenue-neutral tax reform that calls for closing what she calls corporate loopholes.
Those comments drew immediate fire from Fair Tax supporters who said she glossed over the pre-bates and elimination of the other taxes so that most people would not wind up paying more. Jim Duffie, director of Georgians for Fair Taxation, said he had tried on two occasions to try to meet with her to explain.
“This does not speak well for a candidate who claims that she is running to try and bridge the partisan divide and intends to work with all sides in solving problems for the people of Georgia,” he said.
Partisanship is an issue in the campaign. Although Nunn vows to work with Republicans, she has said she will vote for a Democrat as leader of the Senate. Since the leadership sets the agenda, Perdue has made a point of attacking her as a “rubber stamp” for the Democrats’ ultimate leader, President Barack Obama, who’s not popular in Georgia.
She has also refused on multiple occasions to distance herself from a flyer the Democratic Party of Georgia distributed to black voters to spur them to the polls. It implies that if they don’t, their unarmed children could be subject to police shootings like the one in Ferguson, Missouri. Critics say her reluctance to refute the use of the race card as an inappropriate tactic suggests that at her core she really is as partisan as any other politician.
“What I’m focused on is getting as many people out as possible to vote,” she said.
Nunn comes from a long line of Democratic officeholders, most recently her father who rose in the Senate to chair the Armed Services Committee. She plans to request assignment to the same committee and to be the kind of moderate that he was.
She spent most of her youth in Washington when he lived there, and she learned at his knee, so to speak, how the Senate operates. His contacts have helped her raise money and gain national attention, and supporters hope that her election will usher in a resurgence in Democratic power like the days when he was in office.
Follow Walter Jones on Twitter @MorrisNews and Facebook or contact him at walter.jones@morris.com.
