Panelists debating a proposed constitutional amendment creating a new state elections/ethics board offered starkly different views about the threats to separation of powers. Critics see the proposed amendment — establishing a Bipartisan State Board of Elections and Ethics Enforcement — as a continuing effort by Republicans to shift executive branch authority to the legislature. Advocates...
A three-member panel of Superior Court judges didn’t issue a decision after hearing testimony Friday in a state legislative redistricting challenge. But the judges won’t wait long. Wake County Judge Paul Ridgeway said the panel would review arguments and documents from opposing lawyers. He said the opinion would be released as quickly as possible. The...
Editor’s note: This story was edited after initial publication to include information about legislation from Sen. Jeff Jackson and Gov. Roy Cooper’s proposed litigation. The Republican-led General Assembly wasted no time Saturday, Aug. 4, batting down a pair of Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper’s vetoes dealing with constitutional amendments. A Supreme Court candidate affected by the...
A last-minute change to Senate Bill 325 — which originally would have lowered state personal and business income taxes — instead became the vehicle to change early voting hours and days. The move led to a dustup among Republicans and Democrats on the state elections board, which played out in an emergency meeting by teleconference...
The House Select Committee on School Safety has announced plans to appropriate $35 million for a bevy of school safety measures in the upcoming budget. Committee Chairman Rep. David Lewis, R-Harnett and Chairman Rep. John A. Torbett, R-Gaston led a press conference Thursday, May 24, detailing how the $35 million will be divided. The school...
N.C. Republican Party Executive Director Dallas Woodhouse said Democrats’ efforts to compel information from him would chill political speech. Woodhouse hosted a press conference Thursday, April 19, at state party headquarters. He said on April 9 he was served a subpoena forcing him to give a sworn deposition in a civil lawsuit the state Democratic...
Gov. Roy Cooper committed an unforced error by circumventing the General Assembly and creating a constitutionally questionable $57.8 million Atlantic Coast Pipeline fund, political observers and legislators say. Cooper could have been tone deaf to the sour notes his action was sure to sound, they say, and may lack inner circle advisers influential enough to...
The most recent response from Gov. Roy Cooper to legislative leaders about a questionable $57.8 million funding arrangement with the operators of the Atlantic Coast Pipeline might lead to formal demands for information from the Cooper administration. A release issued Tuesday, Feb. 20, from Sen. Bill Rabon, R-Brunswick, and Rep. David Lewis, R-Harnett, who lead...
The exchange of letters between legislative leaders and Gov. Roy Cooper over the Atlantic Coast Pipeline continued Friday as lawmakers expressed exasperation with a response provided a day earlier by the governor’s chief of staff. Rep. David Lewis, R-Harnett, and Sen. Bill Rabon, R-Brunswick, chairmen of the House and Senate rules committees, respectively, resubmitted questions...
Courts have been dealing with gerrymandering — the redrawing of legislative district lines to further a particular political interest — for more than 50 years. Since a series of landmark cases in the 1990s, including some from North Carolina, federal judges have established and refined the principle that legislative redistricting cannot be guided by racial considerations. Determinations that...
The House passed House Bill 90 on Tuesday, Feb. 13, commandeering a controversial $58 million discretionary fund Gov. Roy Cooper created with developers of the Atlantic Coast Pipeline and redirecting the money to education. Republicans praised the legislation because it incorporates several key education provisions the House has backed with strong bipartisan support. Democrats complained...
