GOP gubernatorial candidate Pat McCrory said he was inclined to support legislation to open government personnel files if an issue involved illegality or corruption or misuse of a job when a person is terminated, suspended, transferred or demoted. But he was not in favor of opening files if it just involved job performance.
McCrory also said he favors changing the law so the public could determine whether an employer carried workers’ compensation insurance.
“It has caused a lot of concern among employers where some employers are paying workers’ comp and some are not,” McCrory said in a meeting with The News & Observer editorial board Tuesday. “It is not fair for businesses who are doing it the right way.”
PAC money in judicial race
The super PAC formed to re-elect state Supreme Court Justice Paul Newby is starting to spend money on TV advertising around the state.
The committee, composed of key Republican figures, has not yet reported how much money it has raised or spent. But under new regulations, TV stations must disclose online political campaign ad buys.
A cursory look at stations around the Triangle shows the N.C. Judicial Coalition has dropped nearly $164,000 for TV advertising and production at WTVD for 10 days of ads, and about $22,000 for another 10 days at WNCN.
Jonathan Kappler, research director at the N.C. Free Enterprise Federation, reports he’s counted $440,000 worth of N.C. Judicial Coalition ad buys statewide.
Super PACs can raise and spend unlimited money on behalf of or in opposition to candidates, so long as they don’t coordinate their activities with the candidates’ campaigns.
Newby and challenger Judge Sam “Jimmy” Ervin IV had raised close to the same amount of money on their own, as of the first half of this year.
Fact check on RGA ad
The Republican Governors Association is airing a TV ad in North Carolina that attacks Lt. Gov. Walter Dalton for his one-time support for a sales tax increase – the third such commercial from the group on the issue.
The 30-second spot starts with a clip of the Democratic candidate for governor criticizing Pat McCrory’s tax plan, saying it could lead to higher sales taxes. And then hits Dalton for previously supporting a three-quarter of a penny sales tax for schools, pitched by Gov. Bev Perdue earlier this year.
The RGA hit the same theme in a previous ad that Dome ruled false in a fact-check. But this time the Washington-based group tweaked the wording to more accurately reflect that Dalton did support the tax increase; he doesn’t anymore.
Still, the new RGA ad incorrectly cites a UNC business school study as concluding that a sales tax increase would kill 8,000 jobs.
The study says no such thing.
The ad also calls the tax increase the “Perdue-Dalton” plan. Such classification is misleading because the plan was not a joint proposal. Many Democrats supported increasing the sales tax to boost education funding in the state budget.
(McCrory hasn’t said how he would pay for his plan to reduce corporate and personal income taxes but vowed not to touch the sales tax rate.)
McCrory touted in Tuesday night’s debate that his TV commercials are all positive. But he refused to acknowledge that the RGA is acting as his attack dog.
A busy day for rallies
Democratic National Committee Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Shultz will be in Raleigh on Thursday morning as part of the Democrat’s get-out-the-vote effort.
She will be part of the GottaVote bus tour, which will hold its first rally of the day at 10:30 a.m. at 2521 Dunn Ave. on the N.C. State University campus.
She will be accompanied by Dalton, U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk, and U.S. Rep. David Price. The group will then head out to Wilson, Greenville and New Bern.
The NCSU campus will also see the Republican National Committee chairman later in the day. Reince Priebus will headline a rally at the Brickyard at 2:45 p.m. Also attending the rally will be U.S. Rep. Renee Ellmers and congressional candidate George Holding.
Staff writers Rob Christensen, Craig Jarvis and John Frank
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