Dan Bishop suggests he’ll be like Texas AG. Here’s what that means for NC | Opinion
U.S. Rep. Dan Bishop is offering North Carolina some clues to the kind of prosecutor he would be if he’s elected as the state’s next attorney general.
On multiple occasions, Bishop has invoked the name of Ken Paxton, the Trump-allied Republican attorney general from Texas, as someone he might ally himself with if elected.
To the average North Carolinian, that doesn’t mean much. But to Bishop’s ultraconservative base, it seems designed to signal that he’s exactly the kind of MAGA warrior they want on their side.
“I’m going to be in the attorney general’s office in North Carolina and join the fight with Ken Paxton and other great state attorneys general around the country to protect people’s rights and get the job done,” Bishop vowed in a recent appearance on Steve Bannon’s “War Room” podcast.
Bishop referenced Paxton’s move to sue the Biden administration over new Title IX guidelines that include “sexual orientation” and “gender identity” as protected classes — guidelines that aimed to protect LGBTQ+ students from discrimination in schools. Twenty-five other Republican attorneys general also sued the Biden administration over the changes.
That’s just one example of the aggressive and political approach Paxton has brought to the office of attorney general in Texas. Since taking office in 2015, Paxton has sued the federal government dozens of times, spending millions of dollars in lawsuits that have only occasionally yielded results for the people of Texas. Some of those lawsuits include suing the Biden administration over noncitizen voting allegations, a rule protecting privacy for women who get abortions in other states, guidance requiring doctors to provide abortions in emergency situations and for declaring a Texas lizard an endangered species.
On numerous occasions, Paxton has used the attorney general’s office as a weapon to fight battles on high-profile political issues. He used the full strength of his office to prevent a Texas woman named Kate Cox from receiving an emergency abortion when it was medically necessary, an abjectly cruel crusade that launched Cox into the national spotlight as a face of the post-Roe abortion rights movement. Perhaps most notably, Paxton filed a lawsuit in 2020 that attempted to overturn election results in four key battleground states, baselessly claiming that the results were tainted by fraud. Bishop was one of many congressional Republicans to sign onto that lawsuit.
Paxton has fought these legal battles all while being in legal trouble himself. He was impeached (and acquitted) by the Texas legislature last year, and he remains under federal investigation for corruption amid allegations of bribery and misuse of office.
In February, Bishop appeared on a panel at the Conservative Political Action Conference alongside Paxton and former Donald Trump adviser Stephen Miller, where the trio discussed how to combat liberal “lawfare.”
“We have to fight back,” Bishop said during the panel. “That’s what Ken Paxton’s example has been in Texas … we need more soldiers on the field who can make a difference like Ken has done in Texas.”
While it is the attorney general’s job to protect the rights of North Carolinians, it traditionally is not used in such an aggressive and blatantly political manner. Attorney General Josh Stein, for example, has used the office to negotiate settlements with the e-cigarette giant Juul and opioid companies. Those funds are then used to launch programs aimed at reducing youth nicotine use and help communities impacted by the opioid epidemic. That’s not the kind of thing that makes national headlines, but it does make people’s lives better.
Bishop, for his part, has insisted that politics has no role in the attorney general’s office. But his own reputation as a culture warrior and ideologue precedes him, and comparing himself to a staunch Trump ally who has used his position as attorney general to advance a political agenda isn’t comforting — especially not to those who already worry he’d be an AG that’s hostile to LGBTQ+ rights and reproductive freedom.
This story was originally published October 31, 2024 at 5:00 AM with the headline "Dan Bishop suggests he’ll be like Texas AG. Here’s what that means for NC | Opinion."
