In an earlier post in this series, I discussed how in the mid-20th century, the nation of South Africa transformed from a country people thought of as a democracy (at least for whites) into a dictatorial, fascist junta supported by only a small fraction of the population. What happened in South Africa was not supposed to be a model for 21st-century America, but in the wake of November's elections several states dominated by Republicans are doing everything they can think of to continue to spite the will of the people.
One of my favorite observations on these recent developments comes from Jason Sattler in USA Today, "Republicans have given up on voters. America's future depends on whether Democrats can expand voting rights faster than the GOP can restrict them."
This is the thread that ties together everything I've discussed in this series on the many threats to America's democratic institutions. White, conservative Americans now see that in their lifetimes people of color will become a majority in this country, and they also see that the new multicultural majority is rejecting the neo-liberal politics of Ronald Reagan that seek to perpetually grow power for the wealthy while brutalizing the poor. And the old conservative white hegemony does not intend to let a little thing like democracy curtail their power.
Back to Jason Sattler for an overview of what Republicans in Wisconsin and Michigan since Democrats were elected as the next Governors of those two states:
"The GOP’s smash-and-grab "lame duck" agenda in the Badger and Wolverine states has unfolded rapidly and is blatantly aimed at keeping the right’s rejected policies in place long after Democrats are sworn in. This sort of disdain for the will of voters is possible in large part due the scourge of partisan gerrymandering that's likely illegal.
These unfair electoral maps gave the GOP huge majorities in the Wisconsin and Michigan legislatures when the party barely carried the states in 2016. Last month those maps helped them keep control of both state legislatures, even as Democrats won statewide offices from governor on down."
The changes in the law just signed by defeated incumbent Governor Scott Walker weaken incoming Democratic Governor Tony Evers' ability to put in place rules that enact laws and shield the state jobs agency from his control. They also weaken the attorney general's office (voters elected a Democrat to that office too) and handcuff the ability of the incoming administration to implement the Affordable Care Act. The icing on the cake: Republicans also decided to limit early voting, of course. And Republicans in the state legislature have little to fear from the voters in term of possible backlash to their power grab; gerrymandering of state House districts locks most of them in for as long as they care to stay in office. In last month's election, Republicans held 63 of 99 seats despite Democratic candidates receiving 190,000 more votes statewide.
And say, what justifications have Wisconsin Republican suggested for these power grabs? Well, Robin Vos, the Republican speaker of the Assembly said that in the past, "we made mistakes where we granted too much power to the executive." Yes, he's suddenly realized the Governor has too much power just as a Republican is about to be replaced by a Democrat. But it's all justified as, "We are going to have a very liberal governor who is going to enact policies that are in direct contrast to what many of us believe in."
Meanwhile, (back to Jason Sattler again):
"Republicans in Michigan, where I live, are also trying to deny Democrats elected to statewide constitutional offices the powers that their GOP predecessors took for granted. For instance, they’re trying to take away the secretary of state’s ability to enforce campaign finance laws after (Democrat) Jocelyn Benson was elected secretary of state on a platform of — you guessed it! — better oversight of campaign finance.
But that’s not nearly the most rotten thing going on in Michigan.
Faced with ballot initiatives that would have raised the minimum wage and established earned sick leave for all the state’s workers, Republicans instead passed both proposals last summer as a way to keep them off the ballot and make them easier to change. Now, surprise, they have amended those laws to deny the sick leave to 1 million workers, and slow the rise of the lowest acceptable wage to $12 by 2030 instead of 2022 and, for tipped workers, to $4.58 by 2030 instead of $12 by 2024."
Paul Krugman of the New York Times has also recently discussed how Wisconsin has become, "a state that may hold elections, but where elections don’t matter, because the ruling party retains control no matter what voters do." And he offers the significant observation that, "As far as I can tell, not a single prominent Republican in Washington has condemned the power grab in Wisconsin, the similar grab in Michigan, or even what looks like outright electoral fraud in North Carolina. Elected Republicans don’t just increasingly share the values of white nationalist parties like (Hungary's) Fidesz or Poland’s Law and Justice; they also share those parties’ contempt for democracy. The G.O.P. is an authoritarian party in waiting."
Krugman mentioned North Carolina. Yes, once again we turn to the state where Republicans seem most determined to destroy any semblance of democratic process. A new election is expected in the district in which Republican Mark Harris is credibly accused of hiring operatives who altered and illegally handled ballots.
But last month's election produced some good news regarding the continuing efforts of the Republican legislature to cement control of North Carolina despite the election of a Democratic governor last year. From Tierney Sneed of Talking Points Memo: "A Democrat beat the GOP incumbent for the state Supreme Court, after a failed Republican attempt to rig the election in favor of the incumbent judge. The GOP ballot initiatives that sought to usurp executive power from the Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper were defeated. Whether the GOP will maintain control of both legislative chambers is still too close to call. But it appears that the Republican super-majority— which has allowed the legislature to override Cooper’s vetoes — has been broken."
Finally a suggestion from Paul Krugman on how Democrats can take advantage of public disapproval of the sore-loser power grabs:
"If Democrats can offer a unifying indictment tying Republican attacks on democratic norms to Trump administration abuses, along with a coherent package of serious proposals to restore procedural fairness, voters will have a way of making sense of new examples of Republican sharp dealing. Proposals to shorten lame duck legislative sessions and to constrain their authority, for example, would reinforce the idea that Republicans have been the party of procedural abuses and unfairness while still setting forth a good neutral rule.
This is the alternative to doing nothing or making things worse: seek to punish Republicans in 2020 by offering a vision of how to make things better."
Showing posts with label North Carolina. Show all posts
Showing posts with label North Carolina. Show all posts
Sunday, December 16, 2018
Sunday, September 30, 2018
The Eclipse of American Democracy, Part Eleven: Open Partisanship in the Judicial System
President Trump and his Republican enablers are not shy about their goal of dismantling public institutions as we have long understood them. Consider Trump's communication style. Many folks would consider it inappropriate for the President to begin each day by firing off personal insults against people who disagree with him, including people he appointed to government positions. But according to Trump he's just being, "modern day Presidential." And many folks probably thought that in the 21st century, we would have Presidents that respect the tradition of America as the great melting pot, whereas instead we have an administration that will cheerfully remind you that it is openly white-supremacist and religiously bigoted.
Another way in which we live in a world turned upside down: This week, a man appeared at a job interview and told a number of falsehoods while at times yelling, crying, talking about his love of alcohol, suggesting he is targeted by conspiracy and threatening those who have doubted him. That man was Brett Kavanaugh, appearing before the US Senate he hopes will appoint him to the Supreme Court, and responding to allegations of sexual misconduct. From Benjamin Wallace-Wells of the New Yorker, "The line between judicial independence and partisan politics is thin, often illusory—a pretense, really, but rigorously preserved. This afternoon, that line disappeared entirely. Kavanaugh, "claimed the Democrats were seeking "revenge for the Clintons" and invoked the Bible: "You sowed the wind, now I fear that the whole country will reap the whirlwind."" Republican Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina went further, issuing the threat, "Let me tell you, my Democratic friends. If this is the new norm, you better watch out for your nominees."
To digress for a moment, we need to ask: what is this dangerous precedent that Democrats are setting by suggesting that credible allegations of sexual misconduct be investigated before a man is appointed to an incredibly important lifetime position? From Anna North of Vox.com:
"The message of Kavanaugh’s threats was clear: If he wasn’t safe, then no one was. That message comes from a place of deep privilege. While women have never been safe when coming forward to report sexual misconduct, men like Kavanaugh — white, educated in the country’s most prestigious schools, groomed through high-profile jobs — have long been able to glide smoothly to the highest levels of our government and other arenas of power. That may still be true; the Senate Judiciary Committee is set to vote on Kavanaugh’s confirmation on Friday. But increasingly, these men are not safe from the testimony of women who come forward to share their stories."
Returning to the subject at hand: So then, gone are the days when candidates for federal and state Courts were not openly partisan. And gone are the days when the President might appoint a judge to the Supreme Court without being completely sure of his partisan leanings. Trump's candidates for the federal Courts are vetted and handpicked by the ultra-right-wing Federalist Society. These developments, as evidence by the Kavanaugh nomination, trouble legal scholars. From Matt Kwnong of CBC News:
"Sheldon Goldman was floored by what he heard. The Supreme Court expert with the University of Massachusetts Amherst saw Kavanaugh's aggressive style as a direct appeal to the party of Trump. "The support of the president, that's the name of the game," Goldman said. "It's short-term consideration to keep the support of the Republicans or the president, at the expense of public perception of him and of the court." Except that public perception is vital for the sanctity of a neutral Supreme Court, he said. "It matters to the extent that people will want to accept the court's ruling as legitimate," Goldman said. "And if the court is considered simply another political body, people are going to ask: Why should we insulate these lifetime appointments from politics when they're so heavily involved in politics?"
But once judges are appointed to lifetime positions, at least they can, and hopefully will, adjudicate the law in a non-partisan manner, right? Not if Republicans have their way. Republicans don't care about that old school textbook stuff, the separation of powers in government. Recently, they've discovered that, with legislative majorities locked in by gerrymandering, they can dismantle and remake the Courts at will, and turn them into a system of rubber-stamps for whatever Republicans want. Why didn't anyone think of this before?
In August, the Repubican-dominated state legislature in West Virginia came up with a most novel approach to removing the current judges on a state Supreme Court so that the Republican Governor can appoint new judges: impeach the entire Court. From Doug Criss of CNN:
"The West Virginia House of Delegates' impeachment of the justices on the state's Supreme Court of Appeals is an unprecedented move spurred by an escalating scandal in the state's judicial system. But West Virginia Democrats charge it's just a ploy by Republicans to put more conservative judges on the bench in the state's highest court.
The court's justices -- Chief Justice Margaret Workman and Justices Allen Loughry, Robin Davis and Elizabeth Walker -- are accused of failing to carry out the court's administrative duties and wasteful spending during office renovations."
But let's not be too cynical - perhaps the charges in question are legitimate? Well, the impeachment trial is going on this week, and currently the Justices on trial are being quizzed on "wasteful spending" such are ordering pizza rather than eating in the Capitol cafeteria. High crimes and misdemeanors? So far I'm not seeing them here.
Pennsylvania Republicans have also threatened to impeach their state Supreme Court. Ironically, the threatened impeachment is over another brazen Republican power grab, that's state heavily-gerrymandered map designed to maximize the number of Republicans elected to the US House. The state Supreme Court threw out that map and gave lawmakers a chance to draw fairer lines, but the legislature failed to do so. The call for impeachment never gained traction, so this past June, (from the Associated Press) "Republicans brought forward another plan that could limit the lifespan of the court's Democratic majority: changing the state's constitution to elect appellate court judges in districts, rather than in statewide elections." "The bill passed the Republican-controlled Senate on Wednesday (June 17), blindsiding Democrats who called it a scheme to gerrymander the courts."
Finally, if you've read earlier articles in this series, you won't be surprised to learn that North Carolina Republicans are trying to remake the Courts in that state. It seems no public institution is safe in the state where the Republican legislature (heavily protected by gerrymandering itself) tries to tweak the law on practically a daily basis to thwart democracy and maximize its advantage.
From an August 28 article by Mark Joseph Stern on Slate.com:
"The tumult over North Carolina’s upcoming state Supreme Court election began in 2017, when the GOP-controlled state legislature abolished judicial primaries. Republican Justice Barbara Jackson is running for reelection in November, and GOP legislators hoped to shield her from competition. At the same time, they assumed multiple Democrats would run against each other in the general election, splitting the progressive vote and giving Jackson a smooth path to victory.
"That didn’t happen. Instead, Democrats coalesced around a single candidate, civil rights lawyer Anita Earls. Jackson, on the other hand, drew a Republican challenger: Chris Anglin."
"So Republicans changed the rules. During a hastily called special session, GOP legislators passed a law to strip Anglin of his party affiliation on the ballot. Anglin sued, and a state court blocked the law as a violation of his due process and associational rights under the North Carolina constitution. Speaker of the House of Representatives Tim Moore and President Pro Tempore of the Senate Phil Berger appealed, but an appellate court unanimously declined to reverse the ruling. Rather than appeal to the state Supreme Court—where Democrats currently hold a 4–3 majority—Moore and Berger gave up."
---
Next time I'll be writing about the disaster that is Republican Scott Walker's administration in Wisconsin. Hopefully, I'll be writing about his defeat by Democrat Tony Evers. Keep your fingers crossed.
Another way in which we live in a world turned upside down: This week, a man appeared at a job interview and told a number of falsehoods while at times yelling, crying, talking about his love of alcohol, suggesting he is targeted by conspiracy and threatening those who have doubted him. That man was Brett Kavanaugh, appearing before the US Senate he hopes will appoint him to the Supreme Court, and responding to allegations of sexual misconduct. From Benjamin Wallace-Wells of the New Yorker, "The line between judicial independence and partisan politics is thin, often illusory—a pretense, really, but rigorously preserved. This afternoon, that line disappeared entirely. Kavanaugh, "claimed the Democrats were seeking "revenge for the Clintons" and invoked the Bible: "You sowed the wind, now I fear that the whole country will reap the whirlwind."" Republican Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina went further, issuing the threat, "Let me tell you, my Democratic friends. If this is the new norm, you better watch out for your nominees."
To digress for a moment, we need to ask: what is this dangerous precedent that Democrats are setting by suggesting that credible allegations of sexual misconduct be investigated before a man is appointed to an incredibly important lifetime position? From Anna North of Vox.com:
"The message of Kavanaugh’s threats was clear: If he wasn’t safe, then no one was. That message comes from a place of deep privilege. While women have never been safe when coming forward to report sexual misconduct, men like Kavanaugh — white, educated in the country’s most prestigious schools, groomed through high-profile jobs — have long been able to glide smoothly to the highest levels of our government and other arenas of power. That may still be true; the Senate Judiciary Committee is set to vote on Kavanaugh’s confirmation on Friday. But increasingly, these men are not safe from the testimony of women who come forward to share their stories."
Returning to the subject at hand: So then, gone are the days when candidates for federal and state Courts were not openly partisan. And gone are the days when the President might appoint a judge to the Supreme Court without being completely sure of his partisan leanings. Trump's candidates for the federal Courts are vetted and handpicked by the ultra-right-wing Federalist Society. These developments, as evidence by the Kavanaugh nomination, trouble legal scholars. From Matt Kwnong of CBC News:
"Sheldon Goldman was floored by what he heard. The Supreme Court expert with the University of Massachusetts Amherst saw Kavanaugh's aggressive style as a direct appeal to the party of Trump. "The support of the president, that's the name of the game," Goldman said. "It's short-term consideration to keep the support of the Republicans or the president, at the expense of public perception of him and of the court." Except that public perception is vital for the sanctity of a neutral Supreme Court, he said. "It matters to the extent that people will want to accept the court's ruling as legitimate," Goldman said. "And if the court is considered simply another political body, people are going to ask: Why should we insulate these lifetime appointments from politics when they're so heavily involved in politics?"
But once judges are appointed to lifetime positions, at least they can, and hopefully will, adjudicate the law in a non-partisan manner, right? Not if Republicans have their way. Republicans don't care about that old school textbook stuff, the separation of powers in government. Recently, they've discovered that, with legislative majorities locked in by gerrymandering, they can dismantle and remake the Courts at will, and turn them into a system of rubber-stamps for whatever Republicans want. Why didn't anyone think of this before?
In August, the Repubican-dominated state legislature in West Virginia came up with a most novel approach to removing the current judges on a state Supreme Court so that the Republican Governor can appoint new judges: impeach the entire Court. From Doug Criss of CNN:
"The West Virginia House of Delegates' impeachment of the justices on the state's Supreme Court of Appeals is an unprecedented move spurred by an escalating scandal in the state's judicial system. But West Virginia Democrats charge it's just a ploy by Republicans to put more conservative judges on the bench in the state's highest court.
The court's justices -- Chief Justice Margaret Workman and Justices Allen Loughry, Robin Davis and Elizabeth Walker -- are accused of failing to carry out the court's administrative duties and wasteful spending during office renovations."
But let's not be too cynical - perhaps the charges in question are legitimate? Well, the impeachment trial is going on this week, and currently the Justices on trial are being quizzed on "wasteful spending" such are ordering pizza rather than eating in the Capitol cafeteria. High crimes and misdemeanors? So far I'm not seeing them here.
Pennsylvania Republicans have also threatened to impeach their state Supreme Court. Ironically, the threatened impeachment is over another brazen Republican power grab, that's state heavily-gerrymandered map designed to maximize the number of Republicans elected to the US House. The state Supreme Court threw out that map and gave lawmakers a chance to draw fairer lines, but the legislature failed to do so. The call for impeachment never gained traction, so this past June, (from the Associated Press) "Republicans brought forward another plan that could limit the lifespan of the court's Democratic majority: changing the state's constitution to elect appellate court judges in districts, rather than in statewide elections." "The bill passed the Republican-controlled Senate on Wednesday (June 17), blindsiding Democrats who called it a scheme to gerrymander the courts."
Finally, if you've read earlier articles in this series, you won't be surprised to learn that North Carolina Republicans are trying to remake the Courts in that state. It seems no public institution is safe in the state where the Republican legislature (heavily protected by gerrymandering itself) tries to tweak the law on practically a daily basis to thwart democracy and maximize its advantage.
From an August 28 article by Mark Joseph Stern on Slate.com:
"The tumult over North Carolina’s upcoming state Supreme Court election began in 2017, when the GOP-controlled state legislature abolished judicial primaries. Republican Justice Barbara Jackson is running for reelection in November, and GOP legislators hoped to shield her from competition. At the same time, they assumed multiple Democrats would run against each other in the general election, splitting the progressive vote and giving Jackson a smooth path to victory.
"That didn’t happen. Instead, Democrats coalesced around a single candidate, civil rights lawyer Anita Earls. Jackson, on the other hand, drew a Republican challenger: Chris Anglin."
"So Republicans changed the rules. During a hastily called special session, GOP legislators passed a law to strip Anglin of his party affiliation on the ballot. Anglin sued, and a state court blocked the law as a violation of his due process and associational rights under the North Carolina constitution. Speaker of the House of Representatives Tim Moore and President Pro Tempore of the Senate Phil Berger appealed, but an appellate court unanimously declined to reverse the ruling. Rather than appeal to the state Supreme Court—where Democrats currently hold a 4–3 majority—Moore and Berger gave up."
---
Next time I'll be writing about the disaster that is Republican Scott Walker's administration in Wisconsin. Hopefully, I'll be writing about his defeat by Democrat Tony Evers. Keep your fingers crossed.
Wednesday, July 18, 2018
The Eclipse of American Democracy, Part Nine: Republican Tyranny in North Carolina
When it comes to destroying Democratic institutions, nobody does it quite like North Carolina Republicans. Gerrymandering, racist voter ID laws, closing the polling places - sure, Republicans are doing all that in the Tarheel state, but they're bringing so much more to the game.
From a Time magazine article by Wendy Weiser and Daniel Weiner called, Democracy in North Carolina Could Disappear. Is Your State Next?:
In 2016, "the incumbent Republican Governor lost his reelection bid to Democrat Roy Cooper. Then things turned ugly. Seventeen days before Cooper was to take office, the Republican-dominated legislature passed a package of sweeping changes designed to limit his authority, which the outgoing Republican governor signed into law. The centerpiece of this effort was a plan to ensure continued Republican dominance of powerful state and county boards of elections, which are responsible for running elections in the state and have been controlled by appointees from the Governor’s party for more than a century. (The original law was struck down by a state court in March but then reenacted over Cooper’s veto with only minor changes.)
The new law extends the tenure — indefinitely, for all intents and purposes — of the sitting Republican-appointed Executive Director of the State Board of Elections, North Carolina’s leading election official. She would otherwise have been supplanted by a new Democratic appointee. The law also awards half the seats on state and local election boards to Republicans, which allows them to block any changes to voting rules adopted by the previous Republican-controlled bodies. The law even says Republicans get to chair all election boards during every crucial election year when the President, Governor and all statewide officials are on the ballot.
These changes leave little doubt as to who would really be in charge of North Carolina’s election process — and that is the point. Some legislative leaders openly admitted that one of their main goals of the election board law was to keep Republicans in power."
So in other words, because a Democrat managed to get elected Governor, the Republican sate legislature changed the laws to keep other Republicans in power, and they weren't shy about it. Nor have Republicans limited recent changes to the powers delegated to the Governor to elections boards. They also passed a law that requires that all cabinet appointments be approved by the legislature and that limits the number of state employees the governor can hire and fire to 425. The old limit was 1,500 and was increased from 400 around the time Republican Gov. Pat McCrory took office. Yes, the Republican legislature will cheerfully increase the Governor's powers when a Republican takes over from a Democrat, they reduce them again when another Democrat wins the office.
What else have North Carolina Republicans been up to? How about:
* A 2013 law that made cuts to early voting, created a photo ID requirement and eliminated same-day registration, out-of-precinct voting and preregistration of high school students. North Carolina legislators had requested data on voting patterns by race and, with that data in hand, drafted a law that would "target African-Americans with almost surgical precision," according to the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
* Gerrymandering so severe that Republicans control 10 of North Carolina's 13 US House seats despite the fact the state splits its vote nearly evenly between Republicans and Democrats in Presidential elections.
* Packing the courts. From Ari Berman of Mother Jones: "The GOP attack on the courts began in 2013, when the legislature ended public financing for judicial elections, which had helped elect more minority and women judges. These efforts accelerated after liberal judges gained a 4-3 majority on the North Carolina Supreme Court in 2016. The legislature promptly changed the judicial election system by requiring candidates to represent a political party, the first time a state has moved from nonpartisan to partisan judicial elections since 1921. Republicans reasoned that having to identify as a Democrat would make it harder for liberal judges to win in a GOP-leaning state. The legislature then canceled judicial primaries, giving incumbents (who were mostly Republicans) an advantage due to their name recognition in races where voters were asked to choose among many candidates." Paul Blest of vice.com also notes: "The legislature has passed a number of laws in recent years aimed at limiting the power of the courts, including one (over Cooper’s veto) that phased out three seats on the Court of Appeals, preventing Cooper from making any new appointments in the case of a retirement."
Some good news, over the past two years the courts have not looked kindly on the Republican power grab. The 2013 voter ID law was thrown out by federal courts, and a federal panel has also thrown out the state's congressional map as an illegal racial gerrymander (although the US Supreme Court has put this ruling on hold). A North Carolina court blocked much of the law limiting the Governor's powers of appointment, and another state court blocked the changes to elections boards.
So how are North Carolina Republicans reacting to these judicial rulings? By trying to get rid of the judges responsible, of course. From the Ari Berman article linked above, "Now the legislature has embarked on an unprecedented plan to transform the state’s courts by gerrymandering judicial maps to elect more Republican judges, preventing (Governor) Cooper from making key judicial appointments, and seeking to get rid of judicial elections altogether."
Next time we'll look at Michigan, where Republicans have come up with some novel ways to disenfranchise folks that we haven't discussed yet.
From a Time magazine article by Wendy Weiser and Daniel Weiner called, Democracy in North Carolina Could Disappear. Is Your State Next?:
In 2016, "the incumbent Republican Governor lost his reelection bid to Democrat Roy Cooper. Then things turned ugly. Seventeen days before Cooper was to take office, the Republican-dominated legislature passed a package of sweeping changes designed to limit his authority, which the outgoing Republican governor signed into law. The centerpiece of this effort was a plan to ensure continued Republican dominance of powerful state and county boards of elections, which are responsible for running elections in the state and have been controlled by appointees from the Governor’s party for more than a century. (The original law was struck down by a state court in March but then reenacted over Cooper’s veto with only minor changes.)
The new law extends the tenure — indefinitely, for all intents and purposes — of the sitting Republican-appointed Executive Director of the State Board of Elections, North Carolina’s leading election official. She would otherwise have been supplanted by a new Democratic appointee. The law also awards half the seats on state and local election boards to Republicans, which allows them to block any changes to voting rules adopted by the previous Republican-controlled bodies. The law even says Republicans get to chair all election boards during every crucial election year when the President, Governor and all statewide officials are on the ballot.
These changes leave little doubt as to who would really be in charge of North Carolina’s election process — and that is the point. Some legislative leaders openly admitted that one of their main goals of the election board law was to keep Republicans in power."
So in other words, because a Democrat managed to get elected Governor, the Republican sate legislature changed the laws to keep other Republicans in power, and they weren't shy about it. Nor have Republicans limited recent changes to the powers delegated to the Governor to elections boards. They also passed a law that requires that all cabinet appointments be approved by the legislature and that limits the number of state employees the governor can hire and fire to 425. The old limit was 1,500 and was increased from 400 around the time Republican Gov. Pat McCrory took office. Yes, the Republican legislature will cheerfully increase the Governor's powers when a Republican takes over from a Democrat, they reduce them again when another Democrat wins the office.
What else have North Carolina Republicans been up to? How about:
* A 2013 law that made cuts to early voting, created a photo ID requirement and eliminated same-day registration, out-of-precinct voting and preregistration of high school students. North Carolina legislators had requested data on voting patterns by race and, with that data in hand, drafted a law that would "target African-Americans with almost surgical precision," according to the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
* Gerrymandering so severe that Republicans control 10 of North Carolina's 13 US House seats despite the fact the state splits its vote nearly evenly between Republicans and Democrats in Presidential elections.
* Packing the courts. From Ari Berman of Mother Jones: "The GOP attack on the courts began in 2013, when the legislature ended public financing for judicial elections, which had helped elect more minority and women judges. These efforts accelerated after liberal judges gained a 4-3 majority on the North Carolina Supreme Court in 2016. The legislature promptly changed the judicial election system by requiring candidates to represent a political party, the first time a state has moved from nonpartisan to partisan judicial elections since 1921. Republicans reasoned that having to identify as a Democrat would make it harder for liberal judges to win in a GOP-leaning state. The legislature then canceled judicial primaries, giving incumbents (who were mostly Republicans) an advantage due to their name recognition in races where voters were asked to choose among many candidates." Paul Blest of vice.com also notes: "The legislature has passed a number of laws in recent years aimed at limiting the power of the courts, including one (over Cooper’s veto) that phased out three seats on the Court of Appeals, preventing Cooper from making any new appointments in the case of a retirement."
Some good news, over the past two years the courts have not looked kindly on the Republican power grab. The 2013 voter ID law was thrown out by federal courts, and a federal panel has also thrown out the state's congressional map as an illegal racial gerrymander (although the US Supreme Court has put this ruling on hold). A North Carolina court blocked much of the law limiting the Governor's powers of appointment, and another state court blocked the changes to elections boards.
So how are North Carolina Republicans reacting to these judicial rulings? By trying to get rid of the judges responsible, of course. From the Ari Berman article linked above, "Now the legislature has embarked on an unprecedented plan to transform the state’s courts by gerrymandering judicial maps to elect more Republican judges, preventing (Governor) Cooper from making key judicial appointments, and seeking to get rid of judicial elections altogether."
Next time we'll look at Michigan, where Republicans have come up with some novel ways to disenfranchise folks that we haven't discussed yet.
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