Democrat Sen. Kay Hagan has made increasing the minimum wage a central theme of her re-election campaign, but her actions while a North Carolina state senator and co-chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, Hagan took a lead role in slowing down and almost stopping the wage increasing, opting for a training wage.
In the most recent debate, Hagan went after Tillis saying, “You know I support increasing the minimum wage which speaker Tillis had a really hard time trying to defend that he doesn’t.”
However, this goes directly against what Hagan did as a state senator. According to an old Daily Kos report Kay Hagan was one of several state officeholders to “control the purse strings of the North Carolina budget,” and with that authority, she followed the example of her Republican opponent.
“Kay Hagan sought to cripple the benefits of the minimum wage increase through a Republican tactic that was pioneered by….are you ready for this…..Elizabeth Dole,” the Daily Kos wrote in 2008.
Instead of an increase in the overall wage, Hagan originally supported a training wage of $4.25 per hour for the first 90 days people 20-years-old or younger.