Political Notes -- "Fuck It" Edition

 

Kate Barr, the "Can't Win but Fuck It!" political influencer who has made a second career out of encouraging Democratic candidates to file in districts they can't possibly win -- as an act of revolutionary defiance against Republican gerrymandering -- has announced a new tactic: Can't win as a Democrat? File as a Republican and run a primary against the pasty-assed Tim Moore in Congressional District 14, a safe seat he mapped for himself when he was running the House. It was specifically and quite publicly drawn for him, a lucrative landing pad after Speaker of the NCHouse (which was also a notoriously lucrative perch for Moore -- and don't make me go look up all the investigative pieces exposing his corruption).

Barr told the WashPost, “My message is really about fairness. And it’s consistent with when I ran for state senate district 37 in ‘24,” she said. “We need fair maps. We deserve fair elections. We, as voters, should be able to hold our elected leaders accountable. And it is wrong that we can’t.”

Dave Boliek, the rubberstamp
for suppression of the vote in NC

On Friday, reporter Bryan Anderson broke the news that Paul Cox, General Counsel to the State Board of Elections, resigned his job, citing the highly partisan nature of the new board under Republican control. Guys as extreme as Francis X. DeLuca, former president of the Civitas Institute, and Robert Rucho, former Republican state senator with too many axes to grind, and their new boss, State Auditor Dave Boliek, a former reactionary Democrat with much to prove to his new Republican masters, not to mention the ineffable Dallas Woodhouse, appointed by Boliek to "oversee" county boards of elections -- all of that became too much for a lawyer with professional integrity which was itself based on an understanding that the administration of elections cannot become a partisan battleground, which would violate the statutory mandate of the Board of Elections. Ever since the Berger/Moore General Assembly took the Board of Elections away from Gov. Stein and gave it to the newly minted MAGA Republican Dave Boliek, we've always known what was afoot and what was indubitably ahead of us, ahead of anyone who wants to insure the voting rights and ballot access of all citizens. Paul Cox set a flare over the ice berg's drift.

In January of 2024, an Avery County man named William J. Barthel attended a special meeting of the Avery County Commish, stood at the back of the room so he wouldn't obstruct anybody's sightline, and unfurled a banner which made crude comments about the Commish's clerk, Cindy Turbyfill. The sheriff's department immediately descended on Barthel, told him to take the banner down; he refused; the commish chair told him he had to leave. At which point Barthel, who had been totally silent up to that point, asked "Why do I have to leave?" I'm exercising my constitutional rights. He was uncooperative which led to his handcuffing outside the courtroom. He was charged with disrupting an official meeting and with resisting arrest. After being convicted in Avery District Court, he appealed to the Superior Court and got a two-day trial with a jury before Judge Gavenus. Again, he was convicted, sentenced to 30 days, suspended for 18 months of supervised probation. 

Cohen v. California (1971)
ruled that this banner was free speech

A panel of the NC Court of Appeals just reversed all of that: "[Barthel] argues that the First Amendment protects his silent display of a crude banner criticizing [Cindy Turbyfill] at a board meeting. We agree. The First Amendment shielded his right to stand silently at the back of the boardroom with his vulgar banner during the public comment period. Because his arrest was unlawful, Defendant had the right to resist it without using excessive force. He used reasonable force. We therefore vacate both convictions." Republican Judge Donna Stroud wrote the opinion. Chief Judge Chris Dillon and Judge Fred Gore, two other Republicans, concurred.

I'm deliberately not reprinting here what Barthel's banner said (let alone his highly-offensive-to-many T-shirt), but if you click the link in the previous paragraph, you can read it for yourself in the Appeals Court order. I laughed out loud. And then I had to start googling. The court identified Turbyfill as a commissioner. She's not. She's clerk to the board and also assistant county manager. There's obviously a juicy story behind Barthel's grudge against her. Maybe someone in Avery who reads here will enlighten us.

Failing Upward

 

Kate Barr has become a force in North Carolina grassroots organizing. I had no idea.

Remember Kate Barr? I first knew her as Kate Compton Barr. She was the fireplug entrepreneur from Davidson, NC, who mounted a "Can't Win But Fuck It!" campaign for the NC Senate in '24 in District 37, which includes red Iredell. She didn't want to raise money, she announced, so she requested that people not contribute. In other words, with wit and a cheerful demeanor, she dramatized political hopelessness as positive energy, which (ironically?) inspired hope in all sorts of people, and Kate Barr knew how to network, and though she had not asked for money, money came in. I contributed to the Kate Barr campaign. Running-to-lose in that Senate race -- and she did lose as expected by 30 points -- was performance art, a satire of gerrymandering and a display of personal sacrifice that has actually produced something of a movement. The left's favorite podcaster Heather Cox Richardson named Kate Barr as a Democratic force to watch nationally. 

She's successfully launched the Can't Win Victory Fund, to make losing into a political investment. The entrepreneur in Kate Barr saw losing as an opportunity to network and build communities that grow their clout. Of particular note is her team's creation of an A.I. intelligence, MOXIE, that can channel the opinion (and mood?) of "targeted voters" (you pick the parameters). Message testing and innovation. That's intense.

Take a look at everything that she and her partners are doing. Full disclosure: I made a new contribution. This is energy I like. This is energy we need in heavily gerrymandered communities.

BREAKING -- The Street Theater of Kate Barr

 

One of my favorite, disruptive Democrats of 2024, Kate Barr, is right now, on Tuesday, January 14, reading aloud the over 60,000 names of legitimate voters Jefferson Griffin intends to disenfranchise to grab a seat on the NC Supreme Court. Kate is standing in front of the Supreme Court bldg in Raleigh, with a podium and a microphone. She began reading all 60,000 names this morning at 6 a.m. and expects to finish by 11 p.m. tonight.

It's a new public way to protest the outrageousness of Griffin's determination to win at all costs, including throwing out thousands of legitimate votes. Griffin is currently begging the Paul Newby Supreme Court to ignore the actual vote count -- Allison Riggs won by over 700 votes, after two different recounts -- and simply give Supreme Court Seat 6 to him.

Griffin is a special kind of sinister. Why is he a judge at all? (He currently sits on the 15-member Court of Appeals).

More about Kate Barr under this photo.

Kate Barr should be familiar to WatWatch readers. In 2024 she ran a funny, satiric, self-deprecating NC Senate campaign for District 37 (mainly deep-red Iredell). Her self-mocking motto: "Clear Eyes, Full Heart, Can't Win!" Indeed, she couldn't. But she generated something of a movement anyway, raising both money and some justified hell, and her rallying of progressive voters in such a district also helped a statewide candidate like Supreme Court Justice Allison Riggs to win.

You go, Kate!

The Democratic Hero of NC Senate Dist. 37

 

Kate Barr (in mauve, seated at head of table),
with some of her campaign volunteers

I wrote about the singular Democrat Kate Barr back in December. She had just signed up to run in the newly gerrymandered Senate Dist. 37, wherein the Republican elves carved the liberal enclave of Davidson off from Mecklenburg and stuck it in a district with Iredell County, making a district that is 62% Republican. Barr's campaign Twitter bio caught my attention and my fancy: "Dem for NC Senate District 37. Gerrymandered out of a chance. F*ck it. I’m running anyway .... let’s raise a little hell and have some fun."

Her campaign motto, printed on T-shirts and pink hoodies -- "Clear Eyes, Full Heart, Can't Win" -- became a pretty brilliant piece of marketing. The Washington Post's Colby Itkowitz has just reported on Kate Barr's improbable (but oh so hopeful) race, and I'm so glad I sent her money back in December (even though she said at the time that she didn't want anybody's money). What had started as an in-your-fat-face defiance of Republican power grabbing has become a genuine campaign with a sparkly website, yard signs, bumper stickers, and many volunteers willing to hit the streets.

They say Kate Barr can't win, but what she is doing is boosting Democratic performance in an impossible district, which increases the likelihood for Democratic successes in statewide races up above her on the ballot. In other words, Kate Barr is a hero.

Here's what I wrote about her in December, and her Republican opponent.

How To Win By Losing

 

Kate Compton Bar, the NC Senate candidate in Dist. 37 whose slogan "Clear Eyes, Full Heart, Can't Win" has attracted national attention (and a post on this site), was the subject of an NBC Meet the Press segment, which can be viewed here. 

The Meet the Press segment gets into the whole national disgrace of gerrymandering, especially as it's been practiced in North Carolina.

P.S.

Gerrymandering like this shite, pulling Wilmington Black voters out of Senate Dist. 7 (New Hanover) and adding them to the rural whites in Senate Dist. 8 (Brunswick and Columbus), so that incumbent Republican Senator Mike Lee has a better shot at reelection. A national disgrace.

How To Run As a Loser in a Blood Red District

 

Kate Compton Barr is the brand spanking new Democratic candidate for Senate District 37, and I like her style. First heard about her on Joe Bruno's Twitter feed, an article headlined "‘Clear eyes, full heart, can’t win’: Why Kate Barr is running anyway." Watched her intro video on Instagram. She's a bright light -- a heavily credentialed behavior scientist, mother of two, volunteer everything, but also a force of nature in business, founding a start-up called "Pip and Grow," a high-end catalog of "elegant, eco-conscious products expertly designed to keep your child safe." Linked In:

As the owner of a start-up, Kate is involved in nearly every aspect of running the business - from corporate strategy to customer service. Not only is she in charge of logistics and inventory management, but she also handles company finances and pricing models. Kate is the primary content creator for the Pip & Grow blog and contributes to social media messaging. She also works in partnership with her co-founders to create and maintain influencer, media, and customer relationships.

The company garnered national attention winning both Outstanding Small Business and Retail Small Business at the 2018 SCORE Awards, an NC IDEA Seed grant in November of 2019, and Charlotte's Social Impact Inno on Fire Award in January 2020. Kate’s business journey has been widely documented in publications including Forbes and MSN.

According to Linked In, her control of Pip & Grow ended last April, and she's now running for the NC Senate out of principle -- people ought to have a choice -- in a gerrymandered district that is 62.3% Republican. She's a self-knowing sacrifice, and strategic about it. That motto, "Clear Eyes, Full Heart, Can't Win," a brilliant piece of marketing. Instead of a terrible burden of marching to electoral execution -- dead candidate walking -- Kate Barr might be having the time of her life (and she actually could gather a movement of self-conscious parodists: "Get in losers, we’re (not) going to the Senate! #getinlosers #katebarrcantwin." Jokes can become movements. Yes they can. That's my theory.)

Kate Barr's shorthand Twitter bio: "Dem for NC Senate District 37. Gerrymandered out of a chance. F*ck it. I’m running anyway .... let’s raise a little hell and have some fun anyway."

Website: https://www.katebarrcantwin.com/

The Republican Incumbent

Vicki Sawyer was said to have played a role in keeping the Republican caucus from going even more whole-hog extreme on abortion -- which is why we got a 12-week ban instead of a six. I called her "moderate" when she first ran in 2018 (and beat the blustery Bob Rucho in that year's primary):

Member of the Iredell County Planning Board and treasurer of the Iredell County Republican Party. Sawyer and her husband own Sawyer Insurance & Financial Services in Mooresville. She seems civic -- served on the Iredell County School Facilities Task Force, co-chaired the successful 2014 school bond referendum committee, and has been president of Lakeshore Elementary and Middle School Parent Teacher Organizations. She is a Methodist.

Sawyer's now serving her 3rd Senate term (but in three different districts, because of the repeated attempts among her brethren to harvest, then prune, then harvest again the succulent fruits of gerrymandering).