It’s not exactly a secret that Democrats have had a tough election season, but the party did surprisingly well in North Carolina. While the GOP ticket won the Tar Heel State by about 3 points, Democrats scored some key victories in North Carolina this year, winning the races for governor, lieutenant governor, attorney general and state superintendent of public education.
Moreover, Democrats even won enough legislative seats to break Republicans’ veto-proof majority in the North Carolina General Assembly. Taken together, the state’s election results were a bright spot in an otherwise bleak cycle.
In theory, Republican officials in North Carolina should take this opportunity to pause and take stock of what went wrong. In practice, however, Republican policymakers had a different approach in mind. NBC News reported:
Republican lawmakers in North Carolina voted to override a governor’s veto of a bill that would strip the state’s new Democratic officials of key powers. The GOP-led House of Representatives voted along party lines Wednesday to override outgoing Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper’s veto of legislation ostensibly aimed at hurricane relief but also weakening the authority of offices statewide that Democrats won in last month’s election, including governor and attorney general.
In other words, Republican lawmakers saw the voters’ verdict and recognized that they were soon about to lose power. Instead of honoring the will of the state’s electorate, they attempted to complete a brutal power grab, thumbing their nose at democracy.
In one of the most dramatic examples, the power to appoint members of the North Carolina Board of Elections will now shift from the governor’s office to the state auditor’s office. Why would Republicans take such a step, given how little sense it makes? Because a GOP candidate won the accounting race this year.
The party wasn’t even subtle about its motivations. The New York Times reported:
State Rep. Tim Moore, the outgoing Republican speaker of the House of Representatives, openly said before the vote that the bill was intended to help his party win future elections. “This action item today will be critical to ensuring that North Carolina continues to do what it can to deliver victories for Republicans up and down the aisle and move this country in the right direction,” said Mr. Moore against Trump. ally and conservative podcaster Stephen K. Bannon on Wednesday.
Gov. Roy Cooper, a Democrat who is set to step down after two terms, described the undemocratic veto override as “shameful,” which seemed more than fair given the circumstances.
This article was originally published on MSNBC.com
