Does a one-seat partisan advantage in the drawing of North Carolina’s new congressional district maps amount to an extreme partisan gerrymander that is impermissible under the N.C. Constitution? That was much of the focus on the first day of a trial on the constitutionality of new congressional and legislative maps…
Gov. Roy Cooper has vetoed more legislation than all other North Carolina governors combined. With the past three vetoes stamped over the past three weeks, Cooper’s total comes to 57 vetoes, and the session isn’t over. The next closest was Democrat Gov. Bev Perdue, with 20 vetoes during her…
A Civitas poll out Thursday, May 13, finds North Carolina voters are growing sightly in their support for Republicans in the N.C. legislature, and decreasing slightly in their support of legislative Democrats. If the election were held today, 48% of those polled said they would support the Republican candidate, up…
The early returns are in. So far, Chief Justice Cheri Beasley’s election protests have flopped. The Democratic incumbent is challenging the outcome of her race against Republican Justice Paul Newby. Newby led by 366 votes before Beasley filed formal protests to elections boards in 89 of…
A handful of House Republicans have introduced a series of bills to limit the governor’s powers in a state of emergency, a move that’s likely to further divide politics in Raleigh, political scientists say. House Bill 1059 would prohibit the governor from preventing…
In politics, timing really is everything. That’s the key takeaway for North Carolina’s 11th Congressional District this election season, says Chris Cooper, a political science professor at Western Carolina University. In December, Rep. Mark Meadows,…
The General Assembly will look a bit different after the 2020 session. Twenty-four lawmakers — Republicans and Democrats — have opted not to run for re-election. Institutional knowledge will shrink as experienced lawmakers leave the General Assembly, political scientists say. But the turnover may allow new issues and…
The 9th Congressional District race, one political expert says, may come down to voters’ perception of which candidate has moved closer to the center. State Sen. Dan Bishop, R-Mecklenburg, won a crowded Republican primary for the 9th Congressional District seat. Bishop got 14,361 votes, or 47.7%…
Republicans want to protect their supermajority in the General Assembly. No surprise there. What does have political analysts talking is how openly GOP leaders have stated that as a goal as they draw new, court-ordered legislative maps. Earlier this year, a federal three-judge…
When Roy Cooper was elected governor of North Carolina, he faced an uphill battle to fulfill any of his campaign promises. Republicans held a supermajority in the General Assembly, essentially taking away Cooper’s veto power — his main form of leverage. Then in a special session before Cooper was inaugurated, legislators passed several measures further limiting Cooper’s power. They removed the governor’s ability…
