NC Senate leader targets racial equity task force created under Roy Cooper
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Berger plans legislation to limit governor's power to form future task forces.
- Task force formed after Floyd protests remains active under DOJ and DPS leaders.
- Crime bill under development includes bail reform, death penalty, and oversight.
Good Sunday morning to you, and thanks for reading. I’m Dawn Vaughan, The News & Observer’s Capitol bureau chief.
In last week’s Under the Dome newsletter about Democratic Gov. Josh Stein, I wrote that one of the remaining powers he has that the Republican-controlled General Assembly hasn’t taken away is the ability to form task forces.
Well, that didn’t last long. Senate President Pro Tempore Phil Berger plans to remove some of that power, at least for one task force.
The General Assembly is set to return to Raleigh on Sept. 22, and Berger and House Speaker Destin Hall told reporters that they’re working on a crime omnibus bill inspired by the fatal stabbing of Iryna Zarutska last month on Charlotte light-rail transit. Among priorities related to cashless bail, reviving the death penalty and magistrate rules, Berger is targeting a task force created under former Gov. Roy Cooper.
“We can start by ensuring that Gov. Stein and other members of the executive branch cannot establish any future task forces like the one Roy Cooper created that advanced weak on crime policies, that kept Iryna’s murderer on the streets,” Berger said.
Task forces don’t have any power, however, beyond recommendations.
Berger did not provide any evidence that the task force itself kept Zarutska’s killer, DeCarlos Brown Jr., from being locked up.
Our colleagues at the Charlotte Observer have a detailed breakdown of Brown’s criminal history and the role played by a magistrate judge who had released him without making him post a bond, following state law and county policy.
Cooper is now running for U.S. Senate in 2026. Lawmakers invited his likely opponent, Michael Whatley, to their news conference at the Legislative Building.
Cooper created the Task Force for Racial Equity in Criminal Justice in 2020, in the wake of the George Floyd protests. It was originally led by then-Attorney General Stein and N.C. Supreme Court Justice Anita Earls, and then by Earls and Department of Public Safety Secretary Eddie Buffaloe Jr. Cooper, Stein and Earls were all elected as Democrats.
Stein’s office told The N&O on Sunday that Cooper’s executive order creating the task force expired. The public safety agency’s webpage notes that it ended on Dec. 31, 2024.
The task force published reports in December of 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023 and 2024, all of which can be viewed on the Department of Justice website. The 2024 report describes four years of accomplishments during the Cooper administration, including law enforcement training in de-escalation and crisis intervention; establishing the Juvenile Sentence Review Board in the governor’s clemency office; protecting pregnant women in jails and prisons; and establishing an Office of Violence Prevention in the Department of Public Safety.
Berger thinks the task force’s recommendations pay more attention to the perpetrators of crime rather than the victims of them.
“They reflect an attitude on policing, on an attitude on criminal justice, an attitude on how things ought to be taking place,” he said.
“And those attitudes, in many respects, are the things that inform the kinds of decisions that were made by the magistrate in this case and by other magistrates that of the same political ilk,” Berger said.
A Cooper campaign spokesperson told The News & Observer that “this was a heartbreaking, despicable act of evil and Iryna Zarutska’s family and loved ones are in our prayers,” and that “Roy Cooper knows North Carolinians need to be safe in their communities; he spent his career prosecuting violent criminals and drug dealers, increasing the penalties for violence against law enforcement, and keeping thousands of criminals off the streets and behind bars.”
Cooper served two terms as attorney general before becoming governor.
Berger and Hall are still working on the bill, along with Republican Rep. Tricia Cotham and Republican Sen. Brad Overcash. Both leaders said they are also open to input from Stein’s office as well as other lawmakers ahead of releasing the bill Sept. 22.
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Thanks for reading. Reach me at dvaughan@newsobserver.com. I’m also the host of our Under the Dome podcast that posts every Tuesday on all podcast platforms. We are recording our new episode on Monday morning, and I’ll be joined by my Charlotte Observer colleagues as we talk about the aftermath of Iryna Zarutska’s murder and repercussions in Charlotte. If you have questions you’d like us to address on the podcast, email me by Sunday night, so I have a chance to read your messages before our recording on Monday morning.
This story was originally published September 14, 2025 at 5:00 AM.
CORRECTION: A previous version of this story misidentified the current status of the Task Force for Racial Equity in Criminal Justice. The task force expired on Dec. 31, 2024, Stein’s last day in office as attorney general, according to the Department of Public Safety website.
