North Carolina House Republicans scaled back a rule change that would have eliminated the 48-hour notice requirement for gubernatorial veto override votes.
Rep. Destin Hall, R-Caldwell, who serves as chairman of the House Rules Committee, said he had been in talks with Democrat caucus leadership surrounding the veto override rules. The current version, H.B.102, is on the calendar for the February 15 House floor session.
“Myself and other members of House leadership have been in talks and negotiations with Rep. Reives and Rep. Lofton about our proposed permanent House rules,” said Hall.
Hall clarified later that Democratic leaders did not necessarily endorse the final rules package.
“Since around 2011-12 or so, there was a requirement of 48 hours before a veto could be placed on the calendar,” said Hall. “That was not previously the case. Before [2011-12], there was not a notice requirement. Our current rules did away with that completely.”
Hall gave the following three scenarios where the House could take up a veto override vote:
(1) Veto overrides can be voted on so long as they are on the printed calendar that morning.
(2) If the Senate takes up a veto override, the House could take it up on the same day.
(3) A veto override could be taken up on the same day that the bill is received from the governor.
“Our permanent rules will require veto overrides to meet one of [these] three requirements before they can be voted on in the house,” said Hall.
Roy Cooper, a Democrat, has vetoed 75 bills during his time as governor, more than all other N.C. governors combined. To override a veto, it takes 3/5 of the members present and voting in each chamber. The chances of Republicans successfully overriding a veto increased after the November 2022 elections when voters sent a supermajority to the N.C. Senate and one vote shy of a super majority in the House.
Republicans overrode 23 of Cooper’s first 28 vetoes until the 2018 midterm elections, when Republicans retained the majority, but lost a supermajority. Since 2018, Cooper has vetoed 47 bills and the legislature has not been able to overridden any of them.