Environmental and climate action advocates have been celebrating major victories in statewide races in North Carolina. But pro-polluter legislators are trying to ensure that elections only count when the polluters win. After watching their favored candidates lose in the contests for governor, lieutenant governor, attorney general, and secretary of state, these pro-polluter leaders quickly put together and rammed through a new bill stripping powers from incoming Democratic officials. 

Power-Hungry Bill

The vehicle for these moves was a newly written Senate Bill 382, misleadingly titled “Disaster Relief-3/Budget/Various Law Changes.” In fact, the heart of SB 382 is a series of changes to the powers of recently elected state executive leaders, along with new election law changes intended to further limit voting rights.

The key changes in SB 382 include the following:

• Shifts power to appoint the State Board of Elections and the county boards from the Governor (newly elected Josh Stein) to the State Auditor (newly elected Dave Boliek). Why the auditor?  He’s a member of pro-polluter leaders’ party who they believe can be counted on to do as they tell him. They assume the state supreme court will allow the power grab as constitutional because the auditor is a theoretically independently elected member of the executive branch of state government.
• Prohibits the newly elected Attorney General (environmental champion Jeff Jackson) from taking part in any litigation that is “contrary or inconsistent” with the position of the General Assembly (the pro-polluter-led state legislature). This new restriction on the independence of the directly elected state Attorney General is sure to face tests to its constitutionality if it becomes law.
• Further restricts voting rights by reducing the time during which voters have to request an absentee-by-mail ballot by an entire week. It also reduces the time they have to fix mistakes after they are discovered by the local election board (such as a missing second signature) from 10 days to 2.5 days and also reduces the time to “cure” provisional ballots (for example, by taking a qualifying voter photo ID to the local elections board office) by the same period of time. Finally, it reduces the time available to the local boards of elections to review and rule on provisional ballots after election day.

Unethical Process

The process for approving these critical changes to state law followed the pattern for major legislation under the current pro-polluter leadership. The 131-page contents of SB 382 were released to the public just one hour before the final debate and votes began, and the bill was brought to the floor of the House and Senate under procedures which did not allow for amendments. 

Both chambers passed SB 382 and sent it to the governor, who is nearly certain to veto the bill in its current form. Anticipating a veto, the legislature’s latest adjournment resolution sets the next return of the chamber for December 2 for votes on veto overrides.

Playing Politics with Hurricane Relief

“This bill circumvents the will of North Carolinians who clearly voted to see a change of power at the state level. Instead of respecting the voters’ wishes, this pro-polluting majority seeks to do whatever it takes to keep themselves in power. Republicans would rather play politics than help North Carolinians rebuild after the hurricane,” said Dan Crawford, director of governmental relations for the NC League of Conservation Voters (NCLCV). He further noted that this “blatant power grab” was inserted into legislation labeled as hurricane relief in order to claim that “Democrats voted against hurricane relief, when in fact Democrats want more aid and are voting against the power-seeking aspects of the bill.”

Crawford concluded, “NCLCV will continue to stand up against attacks on our democracy because we need a healthy democracy to protect our environment. We will continue to advocate for folks seeking recovery aid from climate disasters, and we will continue to advocate for climate action on the state level.”

We will need your help to call on legislators to reject any attempts to override the anticipated veto of this corrupt SB 382. Stay tuned for an action alert soon.