
{"id":11956,"date":"2010-08-13T04:33:24","date_gmt":"2010-08-13T12:33:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.carrborocitizen.com\/main\/?p=11956"},"modified":"2010-08-13T04:35:41","modified_gmt":"2010-08-13T12:35:41","slug":"on-the-road-to-november","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/2010\/08\/13\/on-the-road-to-november\/","title":{"rendered":"On the road to November"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><figure id=\"attachment_11957\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-11957\" style=\"width: 450px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.carrborocitizen.com\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/08\/TMillsDSC_1098.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.carrborocitizen.com\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/08\/TMillsDSC_1098.jpg\" alt=\"\" title=\"TMillsDSC_1098\" width=\"450\" height=\"299\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11957\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/08\/TMillsDSC_1098.jpg 450w, https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/08\/TMillsDSC_1098-113x75.jpg 113w, https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/08\/TMillsDSC_1098-150x99.jpg 150w, https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/08\/TMillsDSC_1098-360x239.jpg 360w, https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/08\/TMillsDSC_1098-120x80.jpg 120w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 450px) 100vw, 450px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-11957\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Thomas Mills in his Carrboro office  \u00e2\u20ac\u201d Photo by Ava Barlow<\/figcaption><\/figure><em>A Few Moments with Thomas Mills<br \/>\n<\/em><br \/>\n<em><strong>By Kirk Ross, Staff Writer<\/strong><\/em><br \/>\nA Sunday afternoon, and Thomas Mills is doing something he doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t often find time to do: relax.<\/p>\n<p>With his wife, Jenae Tharaldson, and their two children, Lucy and Atticus, up north visiting her family and the summer doldrums temporarily influencing the world of politics in which Mills is often immersed, Sunday was unusually quiet.<\/p>\n<p>A little downtime might have come earlier had Mills\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 top client, N.C. Secretary of State Elaine Marshall, not been faced with a runoff against former state Sen. Cal Cunningham in the race for the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate.<\/p>\n<p>Ultimately, Marshall\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s second victory looked easy, but it dragged the campaign season out an additional six weeks. It also put to rest any notion that Cunningham\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s perceived favor with the national Democratic Party leadership would trump Marshall\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s name recognition and populism.<\/p>\n<p>In the days immediately after the win, praise was heaped on Mills, who has been immersed in the nerve-wracking world of politics and elections since 1994. Known locally for his work for former Chapel Hill Mayor Kevin Foy and state Sen. Ellie Kinnaird, and around the state for work in state legislative races, Mills suddenly found himself in the national spotlight, with pundits such as The Washington Post\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Chris Cillizza tipping their hats.<\/p>\n<p>Since then, although he was running a campaign against the D.C. establishment, taking two primaries in a row has seemed to smooth over any hard feelings.<\/p>\n<p>Asked how winning decisively has influenced the relationship, Mills beamed a bit. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153We get along just fine now,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d he said.<\/p>\n<p>After the election, he didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t waste much time in the stratosphere and readily admits that while he believes Marshall is the right candidate for the right time, it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll be a tough fight through November.<br \/>\nPolitics is no longer about lining up endorsements and expecting organizations to deliver their constituencies. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Voters are far more independent,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d he said. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153You have to reach out to every voter.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>Between now and Election Day, the volatile environment and uncertainty about who will actually show up at the polls means there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a lot of work to do.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll be spending a lot of time in the voter files between now and then, trying to get an idea of what the electorate looks like,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d he said.<\/p>\n<p>And mostly, he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll be on the phone.<br \/>\nAlthough he used to work out of his comfortable, sprawling and occasionally toy-strewn home in old Carrboro, Mills now heads to an office at 605 Main St. to plug in his headset and meet the day.<\/p>\n<p>He recently found out that he spent 95 hours on the office phone in July \u00e2\u20ac\u201c not a particularly hot month in politics. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153That doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t include the cell phone; add another 15 to 20 hours on,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d he said, looking a little like a marathoner talking about the joy found in the uphill portion of a race.<\/p>\n<p>A Wadesboro native and one of four rowdy sons of a now-retired superior court judge, Mills was around Democratic Party politics from a young age.<\/p>\n<p>He also was no stranger to this community. His mother, whose maiden name was Penny Martin, is a Chapel Hill native who lived near Gimghoul Castle and later in a house where the parking lot of the Carolina Inn in now located.<\/p>\n<p>Mills came to school here in 1981, worked jobs as a carpenter and got involved in social work. He and his first wife, Katherine, and their daughter, Jasper, moved to Cleveland County for a while. That\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s where Mills started to get involved in legislative races. He moved back to town in 1996 to be closer to Raleigh and a growing number of clients.<\/p>\n<p>Here he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s been in some tough races, helping Kinnaird defeat Howard Lee in a redistricting-driven primary between two popular incumbent state senators and Kevin Foy in his first race for mayor against fellow council member Lee Pavao in an open race for the seat. In the statewide races, he likes to make sure Carrboro and Orange County come in big for his candidates, as evidenced by his corralling for Marshall of a wide majority of local elected officials during the primary.<\/p>\n<p>He\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s fond of saying that win or lose he enjoys a good fight, and while he understands his role is to advise candidates rather than shape policy, he prefers to work with candidates more akin to his rural Democratic Party roots.<\/p>\n<p>Marshall\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s candidacy appealed to him. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153She\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s remarkably accomplished and still humble about her accomplishments.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>And Marshall, who grew up on a farm in Maryland, also balances the rural and urban forces in the state, he said.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153While everybody in North Carolina may not have come from a farm,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Mills said, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153they wish they did.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>The proof of all the work \u00e2\u20ac\u201c and hundreds of hours on the phone \u00e2\u20ac\u201c will be in November. Until then, you might see Thomas Mills surface from time to time \u00e2\u20ac\u201c dropping by Weaver Start Market in the mornings, where he catches up on all things Carrboro, popping over to the Looking Glass for coffee or riding up to Johnny\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s for his favorite tamales.<\/p>\n<p>And if for some reason in the heat of the bare-knuckle battle fixing to begin you might think it odd that Mills is still smiling, please remember: he might be in the fight of his life, but he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s loving every minute of it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A little downtime might have come earlier had Mills\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 top client, N.C. Secretary of State Elaine Marshall, not been faced with a runoff against former state Sen. Cal Cunningham in the race for the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":11957,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,30],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11956","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-top-story"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11956","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11956"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11956\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11959,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11956\/revisions\/11959"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11957"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11956"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11956"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11956"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}