Dems: Shutdown dealt $340M blow to NC economy

Citing data from Moody's Analytics, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee says the recent government shutdown cost North Carolina's economy $340 million.

Posted 4:16 p.m. Oct 29, 2013 — Updated 4:33 p.m. Oct 29, 2013

Mark Binker

RALEIGH, N.C. — The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, a national group that is backing U.S. Sen. Kay Hagan's re-election, is releasing data Tuesday that it says shows the recent government shutdown cost North Carolina's economy $340 million.

Nationally, the economy is expected to lose $20 billion, according to a post-shutdown analysis by Moody's Analytics. That drag will keep U.S. growth somewhere close to "a lackluster 2 percent" rather than picking up steam going into the last quarter of the year. That analysis shows North Carolina being affected less than the average state.

The DSCC used data from the Moody's report to extrapolate the shutdown's cost to North Carolina's overall economic output. It then packaged the information in a news release designed to target the announced GOP contenders for the nomination to challenge Hagan.

"Thom Tillis, Mark Harris, Greg Brannon and Heather Grant put their reckless partisanship ahead of North Carolina when they supported a sixteen day government shutdown that cost North Carolinians up to $340 million," said Justin Barasky, a DSCC spokesman.

Tillis is the speaker of the North Carolina House. Brannon is a Cary doctor and Tea Party favorite. Harris is a preacher and president of the Baptist State Convention. None of them had a vote on whether to shut down the government or not, but Democrats want to associate them with the unpopular move that affected military bases, caused local layoffs of state workers and strained those who benefit from federal entitlement programs.

"Tillis, Harris, Brannon and Grant should be ashamed that, instead of doing what was best for their state and supporting an end to the government shutdown, they played politics and pushed a dangerous partisan political agenda for more than two weeks," Barasky said.

The release is part of the early posturing for the 2014 U.S. Senate campaign in North Carolina, when Hagan will face re-election and will be the only official elected statewide on the ballot.

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