Valentine-themed attack ad in US Senate race will interrupt NC’s ‘Bachelor’ night
News&Observer, DANIELLE BATTAGLIA and FRANCESCA CHAMBERS, 2/11/2022
Ted Budd wants the final rose in his primary campaign for U.S. Senate, and a political group that’s pumping millions into his bid is launching a Valentine’s Day attack ad to help him win it. Budd-backing conservative group Club for Growth plans to run an ad linking former Republican Gov. Pat McCrory to President Joe Biden and other liberal leaders during “The Bachelor” on ABC on Monday evening. “Find someone who loves you as much as Pat McCrory loves liberals,” the ad’s narrator declares to a visual of McCrory backslapping former President Barack Obama.
The hug between McCrory and Biden is shown frequently in attack ads against the Senate candidate. It happened in July 2014 during the National Governors Association meeting, where Biden was a guest speaker. National Review covered the awkward embrace, writing that Biden pulled the then-governor into the hug because Biden was insecure that McCrory wouldn’t give him so much as a smile. He repeated the complaint at least three times during his speech.
His friendly hello to Obama is from the former president’s Jan. 15, 2014 visit to North Carolina to tour a Raleigh-based manufacturing institute. McCrory greeted Obama at the airport and gave him a slap on the back. McCrory’s campaign declined to comment on the attack ad.
NC’s Rep. Ted Budd: Jan. 6 committee is in the way of ‘freedom-loving Americans’
News&Observer, DANIELLE BATTAGLIA, 2/12/2022
U.S. Rep. Ted Budd called his House colleagues Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger “divisive” Wednesday and said their work on the Jan. 6 committee is getting in the way of “freedom-loving Americans.” His comments came during a segment on a conservative talk radio show about whether President Joe Biden is using a back-door plan to influence elections.
Budd is currently seeking North Carolina’s open U.S. Senate seat in the 2022 election and is facing off against former Gov. Pat McCrory, former U.S. Rep. Mark Walker and political newcomer Marjorie Eastman. Former President Donald Trump has endorsed Budd.
All four have said they do not support the violence that occurred when a mob of pro-Trump supporters stormed into the Capitol. But they don’t all agree with what Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said about Jan. 6, which Budd was asked about on Wednesday.
Legal notice alleges Active Energy discharging PFAS into Lumber River; Commerce Dept concerned over wood pellet company viability
NC Policy Watch, Lisa Sorg, 2/11/2022
Active Energy Renewable Power, a wood pellet company beset by regulatory, legal, and operational troubles, is allegedly discharging high levels of toxic PFAS into the Lumber River, a drinking water supply for 25,000 people in Robeson County. The company is also allegedly discharging the compounds into Jacob Branch, a tributary of the Lumber River.
The claims were detailed in a “Notice of Intent to Sue” sent to the company by the Southern Environmental Law Center.
Active Energy did not produce the PFAS, also known as perfluorinated and polyfluoroalkyl compounds, but SELC alleges that the company has run afoul of the Clean Water Act, since 2019, when it purchased the property on Alamac Road in Lumberton. The Clean Water Act prohibits facility owners from discharging any pollutants — including PFAS — from their property into rivers and streams without a federal permit. Active Energy’s outdated permit does not include PFAS in the list of pollutants that can be discharged.
Previous property owners, including a dry cleaning facility and a textile plant, left behind large plumes of groundwater contamination that could be the source. Textiles treated with stain-, water- or grease-resistant coatings often contain PFAS. The history of the site, “led us to be concerned about possible discharges” of PFAS, said SELC attorney Heather Hillaker.
Winston-Salem fertilizer fire reveals regulatory loopholes, spurs hard questions about building and workplace safety
NC Policy Watch, Lisa Sorg, 2/8/2022
Owners of the Weaver Fertilizer plant in Winston-Salem failed to submit a required chemical inventory to the NC Department of Public Safety in 2020, a key piece of information for state and local emergency officials — and a symptom of the lack of oversight of facilities nationwide that handle ammonium nitrate.
Nearly 600 tons of ammonium nitrate caught fire at the Weaver plant on Jan. 31 and burned for four days. The risk of explosion was so great that Winston-Salem officials asked people to evacuate within a mile radius, temporarily displacing 6,000 residents. Residents are now allowed back into their homes, although on Feb. 6, the ruins were still smoldering.
Whether Weaver Fertilizer is also required to file an emergency response plan hinges on that inventory, according to Keith Acree, public information officer with the NC Department of Public Safety. Without the chemical inventory, “it’s unknown if an emergency response plan is required,” Acree wrote in an email.
Book banning battles hit North Carolina schools
NC Policy Watch, Greg Childress, 2/10/2022
Parents of sixth graders in a gifted language-arts class at Marvin Ridge Middle School received an email from their children’s teacher last month warning them that a book selected for the class’s unit on African American literature would at times be “uncomfortable.”
The teacher at the Union County school, Cason Treharn, was confident, however, that her academically advanced students were mature enough to handle Melba Pattillo Beals’s autobiographical account of the Little Rock Nine’s integration of Central High School in Arkansas in 1957.
Beals was one of nine Black students who stared down angry mobs of white racists and segregationists to attend the previously all-white school. The students were taunted by classmates and their parents, threatened by mobs and attacked with lighted sticks of dynamite. It was an ugly time in America but also a seminal moment in the struggle for civil rights, coming as it did in the aftermath of Brown v. Board of Education, the landmark U.S. Supreme Court ruling that deemed “separate but equal” schools unconstitutional.
When it comes to gerrymandering, there simply must be a limit
NC Policy Watch, Bob Schofield, 2/8/2022
Last week, the North Carolina Supreme Court struck down as unconstitutional the most recent batch of egregiously gerrymandered legislative and congressional maps fashioned by Republican majorities at the General Assembly.
It should not have been necessary.
Thirteen years ago this month, Republican senators introduced a bill that would have easily prevented the necessity of such a controversial ruling. Filed on Feb. 2, 2009, by a group that included current Senate President Pro Tem Phil Berger, Senate Bill 25 would have asked North Carolina voters to approve the establishment of an independent redistricting commission.
It seems all but certain that voters would have said “yes” had the measure made it to the ballot.
Unfortunately, Democrats who then ran both houses of the General Assembly, could not get their act together to take up the legislation and they have been regretting that decision ever since. After the GOP swept to power in the 2010 wave election, it seized control of the map drawing process and has clung tenaciously and hypocritically to it ever since.
NC'S REPUBLICAN LEGISLATORS PONDER U.S. EXTREME SUPREME COURT
BlueNC, 2/8/2022
North Carolina lawmakers will start redrawing new political maps quickly, possibly even this week. But at the same time, they’re contemplating appealing their loss in a nationally watched gerrymandering at the state Supreme Court to the only court that could overturn the ruling — the U.S. Supreme Court. The court found that the maps were unconstitutional because of the way the lines minimized the influence of Democratic voters, notably by guaranteeing Republicans would likely still win large majorities even if most voters voted for Democrats.
But as of Monday afternoon there was still no detailed opinion with guidance on how better maps should be drawn. It complicates matters that the court hasn’t given exact details on their ruling to help determine what a fair map is, Moore said, but he and other legislative leaders are hoping for those details soon. Maybe maps that aren't 1000:1 outliers?
https://www.newsobserver.com/news/politics-government/article258138283.html
TIMELINE: The fight over North Carolina's district lines
WLOS, Staff, 2/8/2022
NOV. 4, 2021 - Asheville and much of far Western North Carolina will now be included in the newly created 14th Congressional District. A portion of Watauga County will also now be in the 14th District. McDowell, Polk and Rutherford counties have been moved to the 13th District. (Photo credit: North Carolina Legislature)
After North Carolina's Supreme Court struck down newly drawn district lines, candidates and voters are left to wonder -- What's next?
Here's a breakdown of the events that led to the ruling and what is scheduled to happen next.
NOV. 4, 2021 — North Carolina legislature finalizes three new redistricting maps for the state.
NOV. 10, 2021 — Rep. Madison Cawthorn announces plans to run in another district, District 13.
DEC. 6, 2021 — A legal challenge to North Carolina's new district maps halts candidate filing, which was scheduled to begin at noon.
JAN. 3, 2022 — A trial begins to determine if North Carolina's new district maps violate the state's constitution. Challengers say the maps unfairly dilute the minority vote and heavily favor Republicans.
JAN. 6, 2022 — Trial ends.
JAN 11, 2022 — Three-judge panel rules in favor of the Republican-drawn maps.
JAN. 19, 2022 — North Carolina House and Senate vote to delay 2022 primary election a second time to June 7 to allow time to react to a Supreme Court decision on the maps.
JAN. 28, 2022 — Gov. Roy Cooper vetoes plans to delay North Carolina’s primaries to June.
FEB. 2, 2022 — North Carolina Supreme Court hears arguments from both sides of the district maps lawsuit.
FEB. 4, 2022 — Supreme Court rules 4-3 against the new district maps, saying they violated the North Carolina Constitution.
LOOKING AHEAD
FEB. 18, 2022 — New district maps must be redrawn by 5 p.m.
FEB. 23, 2022 — Deadline for courts to make a decision on newly drawn maps.
FEB. 24, 2022 — Candidate filing for 2022 primary elections is set to resume, ending March 4.
MAY 17, 2022 — North Carolina primary election scheduled to take place.
NC Senate hopeful tweets in Waffle House, and gets covered and smothered on social media
News&Observer, DANIELLE BATTAGLIA, 2/5/2022
Some are calling it “Wafflegate”: A seemingly innocent tweet about breakfast food that led to a social media firestorm reminiscent of a past North Carolina Senate campaign dining controversy. It happened the moment Republican U.S. Senate candidate Mark Walker made the decision around 10 p.m. Thursday to walk into a Waffle House at an undisclosed location, order and take a photo. He was overdressed for the occasion, wearing a suit jacket. And he missed that many North Carolinians wouldn’t think to step into a Waffle House before midnight.
But that wasn’t the part everyone focused on. No, it was his order: A plate of beige-colored food and a hamburger patty. Toast, hash browns and eggs.
No one is quite sure what to make of the eggs. Was it an omelet with nothing in it? Did he forget to have them scrambled the way only Waffle House can do it? Where is the hot sauce? Or at least salt? And there was another issue: Walker wasn’t holding a fork to eat his breakfast-dinner. He was holding a pen. People had questions. A lot of them.
A new strategy is being used to try to end school mask mandates. It has QAnon ties.
News&Observer, T. KEUNG HUI, 2/11/2022
A legal strategy promoted by a QAnon supporter is being used by some parents across North Carolina and the United States to try to force school districts to end face mask mandates and to remove books the parents say are obscene.
The Bonds For the Win website tells parents they can threaten to file “surety bond claims” against school board members and superintendents accusing them of violating multiple laws unless they make changes such as drop mask requirements.
This approach has been used in multiple states, including in North Carolina in Catawba, Iredell, Johnston and Wake counties. “We have people all over the world obtaining these bonds, all over the world,” Miki Klann, who helped create Bonds For the Win, said in a January YouTube video highlighting efforts in North Carolina. “These school districts need to be put on notice, and I really do want them to be listening to us right now.”
Madison Cawthorn ripped for 'egging on' MAGA rioters: 'Real consequences could be on the horizon'
Raew Story, Mark Chapman, 2/10/2022
On Thursday, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch editorial board tore into Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-NC) for his role in encouraging the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol — and analyzed the legal case that could block him from running for office again.
"Increasing numbers of Republicans are joining Democrats in Congress condemning last week’s Republican National Committee statement defending the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection as 'legitimate political discourse,'" wrote the board. "Exasperation and frustration are growing on both sides of the aisle over the lack of accountability for lawmakers who cheered on the insurrection. At long last, real consequences could be on the horizon."
Cawthorn is currently suing to challenge the power of the North Carolina Board of Elections, which is being asked by voters in the district to bar him from running under the 14th Amendment, which states that people who have "given aid or comfort to the enemies" of the United States is ineligible for office. The agency has not actually determined Cawthorn is ineligible, and this would be an unprecedented step — but, argued the editorial board, this would have merit.
'This is only going to lead to one place': Madison Cawthorn foreshadows violence over ballot disqualification
Raw Story, David Edwards, 2/9/2022
Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-NC) warned officials in North Carolina that they could face "dangerous" consequences if he is removed from the ballot for his role in inciting a failed insurrection on Jan. 6, 2021.
Cawthorn's opponents have pushed for the congressman to be disqualified by the NC Board of Elections based on an "insurrection" clause that was added to the U.S. Constitution following the Civil War.
"States have long enforced age and residency requirements, without question and with very few if any legal challenges," the Board of Elections wrote in a court filing. "The State has the same authority to police which candidates should or should not be disqualified per Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment."
Cawthorn appeared on Steve Bannon's War Room podcast on Wednesday and vowed to fight.
Madison Cawthorn is having a bad week
New Civil rights Movement, David Badash, 2/8/2022
Today news broke that the North Carolina State Board of Elections filed a motion Monday declaring it indeed does have the legal authority to determine if candidates should be disqualified for violations of the Fourteenth Amendment (more on that in a moment). About the same time that news broke, Senate Republican Minority Leader Mitch McConnell broke with Donald Trump and almost the entire Republican Party, declaring January 6 was a “violent insurrection” – yes, he used those very words.
The 14th Amendment in part states that no one who has taken the oath of office can be a U.S. Congressman or Senator if they “have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against” the United States.
North Carolina elections board says it has power to disqualify Rep. Cawthorn from running over January 6
CNN, Marshall Cohen and Ethan Cohen, 2/9/2022
The North Carolina State Board of Elections said on Monday that it has the power to block GOP Rep. Madison Cawthorn from running for reelection over his role in the January 6 insurrection -- an open legal question at the center of liberal-backed efforts to disqualify him from future office.
Madison Cawthorn has constitutional right to run for office, attorney says
WLOS, Staff, 2/10/2022
Congressman Madison Cawthorn isn't talking about the challenge to his candidacy, but his attorney is. A group of voters claims the congressman violated part of the 14th Amendment, saying he took part in the Jan. 6 insurrection.
But his attorney James Bopp Jr. said it is a matter of free speech.
"It's in the First Amendment. The freedom of association is protected by the First Amendment. It protects the right to run for office," Bopp told CNN. "That's the reason we have filed a suit in federal court to enjoin this unconstitutional effort to, really, undermine democracy by preventing people from running for office."
NC HOUSE SPEAKER BELIEVES CAWTHORN MAKES VALID POINT IN LAWSUIT (Of course he does)
NC STATE BOARD OF ELECTIONS SAYS CHALLENGE TO REP. CAWTHORN'S CANDIDACY SHOULD PROCEED
Thanks again, have a good week!