NC Republicans stoop even lower in their shameless new power grab | Opinion

North Carolina voters spoke loud and clear two weeks ago when they elected Democrats to some of the most prominent statewide offices.

Republican lawmakers don’t seem to care.

In the waning days of their supermajority, GOP legislators have apparently decided that some of the powers voters gave to Democrats should be entrusted to them instead. Tucked into a 132-page Hurricane Helene relief bill are a number of changes that would strip power away from newly elected Democratic officials.

The most drastic change would move the State Board of Elections under the purview of the state auditor. Currently, the board’s five members are appointed by the governor, so a majority of the members come from the governor’s own party. The bill would strip the Democratic governor of that power and instead give it to the newly elected Republican auditor, who could appoint a Republican majority instead.

But the bill would also restrict the authority of the attorney general, preventing the AG from taking any legal stance that does not align with the stance of the legislature. Current Attorney General Josh Stein occasionally declined to defend state laws that he believed to be unconstitutional, such as the state’s abortion law. Then-AG Roy Cooper refused to defend House Bill 2 in court for the same reason. The bill would also prevent the attorney general from intervening in outside litigation that could potentially overturn laws passed by the General Assembly.

Other parts of the bill would limit the governor’s ability to make appointments to other state agencies, strip powers from the incoming lieutenant governor and superintendent of public instruction, create new, unelected judicial positions and make alarming changes to election administration that officials say could limit their ability to make sure every vote is counted.

All in all, just 12 pages of the 132-page bill are related to Helene recovery efforts, with the rest dedicated to pushing through unrelated changes to state law while Republicans still have the ability to override the governor’s veto. The process by which the bill moved through the legislature was as undemocratic as the bill itself: there was no opportunity for public comment, it was voted upon mere hours after its public release and GOP leaders refused to even answer questions about most of its contents at a press conference Tuesday afternoon. The bill was drafted in secret and Republican lawmakers put it forward in a form that could not be amended.

That Republican lawmakers would seek to redistribute power and rewrite rules in their favor is not a surprise. They’ve done it before. Nor is it a surprise that they would do so in a lame duck session to weaken incoming elected officials with whom they disagree. They’ve done that before, too. This is only the latest installment in a long, tired saga that began in 2016 when Republicans tried to strip powers away from Cooper before he took office — the same way they are doing right now. Courts have blocked many of the legislature’s attempts to redistribute power from the executive branch to themselves — including an attempt to give themselves authority to appoint election officials — but that hasn’t stopped them from trying over and over again.

But using disaster relief legislation — for the deadliest storm in North Carolina history, no less — as a Trojan horse for insidious power grabs might just be a new low. And by combining these changes with Helene aid, Republicans have backed Democratic lawmakers into a corner. Either they can vote for the bill despite its glaring flaws, or they can vote against it and be accused of denying western North Carolinians the relief they deserve. But it’s Republican lawmakers who are betraying vulnerable communities right now by teeing up a choice between disaster relief and democracy.

The fact that North Carolinians elected a mix of Democrats and Republicans to statewide offices suggests that they want power to be shared. They chose checks and balances for a reason. It’s a shame some Republicans aren’t listening.

This story was originally published November 20, 2024 at 5:00 AM with the headline "NC Republicans stoop even lower in their shameless new power grab | Opinion."