Thom Tillis finally made his case — just not to North Carolina

The senator showed real fight in a CNN interview this week. Imagine if he’d brought that same energy back home.

U.S. Sen. Thom Tillis sat down with CNN this week and delivered one of his most spirited, confident defenses of his conservative record to date. He took on his critics directly, saying: “I tell them I agree I’m a RINO — a Republican In Need of Outcomes.”

He ticked through his body of work on the Second Amendment, property rights, and the pro-life cause. And he made a clear, if slightly condescending, argument for the value of governing experience over ideological purism.

It was feisty. It was focused. And it would have played a lot better in Concord or Kinston than it did on national cable.

The full clip is worth a watch.

Here’s the thing: If Tillis had been making this exact case for the last six years at Lincoln-Reagan dinners and county conventions, I think his favorables would look a lot different today.

I remember the 2020 campaign trail. There were plenty of grumbles in Republican circles about Tillis being too establishment, too D.C. But when he showed up in the room, he still got …