The election is over. Here’s where NC lawmakers can start compromising

The split results of the North Carolina election — Republicans holding the General Assembly and a Democratic governor re-elected — allowed both sides to claim victory. What they should do next is proclaim compromise.

After a years-long standoff between Gov. Roy Cooper and Republican legislative leaders, the conditions now favor giving ground on both sides. Cooper, a moderate by nature, no longer needs to court his party’s most liberal members to support his re-election. Republicans, though still in control, can’t reasonably continue with a relentless push for more tax cuts and neglect of the safety net. The pandemic has reduced tax revenue and the state can hardly afford to reduce it further. The pandemic is taking off as daily infections and deaths from COVID-19 hit record numbers. The legislature should step up its funding for public health and economic support of those individuals and businesses the have lost jobs and income.

Both Cooper and Senate leader Phil Berger, R-Rockingham, have said they are willing to work with the other side at a time when the state sorely needs cooperative leadership. But it is a fragile, post-election détente, and a stubborn stand on any issue could lead to a general impasse. Here are several places where North Carolina would be well-served by politicians who rediscover the art of compromise.

• The state budget. Cooper vetoed the Republicans’ budget bill because of its failure to expand Medicaid and its proposal for teacher pay raises he considered inadequate. Democrats — and most North Carolinians — support Medicaid expansion, and teachers generally backed Cooper’s standing firm for bigger raises. As a result, the previous budget was simply rolled over for another two years. The state cannot continue without an updated spending plan, especially given the new circumstances created by the pandemic. Democrats and Republicans should find a budget they can live with and pass it.

• Teacher raises. Cooper put up a good fight and teachers admirably forwent any raise in the interest of getting a sufficient one. But now may be time for Cooper and the teachers to accept something closer to what the Republicans are offering. The decline in state tax revenue makes generous raises — no matter how well deserved — too much to demand for now.

• Medicaid expansion. Berger has been implacable in his opposition to expanding the federal/state health care insurance plan to cover low-income people beyond the elderly, pregnant women, children and the disabled. Opponents of expansion see it as a handout to “able-bodied” people at a cost the state can’t afford and may not be able to control. But 38 states have expanded Medicaid without serious problems and considerable gains. Many Republican lawmakers see the logic and the compassion of providing health insurance to hundreds of thousands of uninsured North Carolinians amid a pandemic. There are ways to adjust an expansion agreement to prevent cost shocks to the state. Republicans should find a way to expand Medicaid under terms that address their concerns.

• Redistricting. Republicans made a farce of the redistricting process when they took control of the General Assembly in 2011. Courts repeatedly rejected their maps as racially biased or excessively partisan, but not before Republicans benefited from several elections with legislative and congressional districts drawn heavily in their favor. Republicans are free to play the same game in the coming decade. Cooper can’t veto redistricting legislation and court challenges could extend over multiple election cycles before being resolved. North Carolina should be spared all that again. Republicans and Democrats should support turning over redistricting to nonpartisan staff or to an independent commission. Both parties have felt the unfairness of the current system and both, when in the minority, have supported changes that take partisanship out of the process.

The races are over. It’s time for governing, work that requires a willingness to compromise.

This story was originally published November 9, 2020 at 12:00 AM.