The North Carolina House could vote Tuesday on a bill restructuring the Local Government Commission by dividing appointment authority among the governor, legislative leaders and state treasurer and removing Democratic Secretary of State Elaine Marshall from the commission. It would also shift oversight of certain state property and contracts, and revise election laws ahead of future elections.
House Bill 268 2026 Budget Technical Corrections II, would remove Democratic Secretary of State Elaine Marshall as an ex officio member of the Local Government Commission and replace that seat with a member appointed by the General Assembly upon the recommendation of Republican Senate leader Phil Berger. It would also require the governor’s appointee to be a current or former mayor or member of a city governing board and to be confirmed by the General Assembly. The appointee would serve a four-year term.
Stein, a Democrat, criticized the proposals after Tuesday’s Council of State meeting, arguing that lawmakers are continuing to shift authority away from Democratic officeholders and toward Republican officials.
Additionally, the bill would allow the State Bureau of Investigation and State Highway Patrol to opt out of Department of Administration oversight for purchasing, contracts, acquiring and maintaining real property, and leasing office space. Any acquisition of real property would still require Council of State approval.
If the measures become law, they would build on appointment changes included in the state budget Stein signed July 7. The budget reduced the governor’s appointment authority on several boards and commissions and assigned some appointments to the General Assembly and other Council of State officials in the executive branch of state government.
election law changes
Stein told reporters after Tuesday’s Council of State meeting that he is evaluating what the legislature is sending him before he decides whether to sign or veto the bill.
He also took issue with House Bill 958, Election Law Changes, which passed the Senate 28-13 on a party-line vote and House Bill 834, State Board of Elections Administrative Changes, which passed 42-0.
Among the most significant changes in HB 958 is a provision that reduces early voting from 17 days to 10 days for primaries, second primaries, and runoff elections. The bill would also direct the state auditor to conduct post-election performance audits of election systems and procedures in randomly selected counties, with every county board reviewed at least once every six years.
HB 834 would extend several post-election deadlines from three business days to five, giving voters more time to correct missing registration information, provide required identification, and resolve certain absentee or provisional ballot problems. It would also address absentee ballot delivery and judicial review of the State Board of Elections’ decisions.
Most major provisions in HB 958 would take effect Jan. 1, 2027, and would not apply to the November election. HB 834 would take effect upon becoming law and could affect this year’s election administration.
The governor told reporters he believes both bills are an attempt to shift power away from Democrats.
“There’s no state in the country where the auditor overseas elections,” Stein said. “The elections have been administered by the governor forever and the governors have treated it as a nonpartisan professional elections administration entity and the auditor here hired the former executive director of the Republican Party to direct the local boards of elections we’ve come to learn on when to have early voting and where to have early voting. That is incredibly damaging to the public confidence, and so what I want is for government to work for people.”
The governor’s appointment authority over the State Board of Elections was transferred to the state auditor under Senate Bill 382, which became law in December 2024, before Stein took office. The auditor’s first appointments took effect May 1, 2025, and the board was administratively transferred to the Department of the State Auditor on July 1, 2025.
The law requires the state auditor to appoint members from lists of nominees provided by the state party chair of the two political parties with the highest number of registered affiliates. Boliek announced his first appointments to the election board in May 2025.
Because the Senate made substantial changes to the elections bills and previously approved by the House, the House must agree to those revisions before either bill can be sent to Stein.
