There's That Familiar Smell, the Odor of Rank Opportunism

 

Apparently there's a discharge petition being pushed by Republican loose cannon Anna Paulina Luna of Florida to get a bill banning stock trading by members of Congress to the floor of the House for a vote, and it would surely pass. Freshman hustler Tim Moore is on a stock-manipulating spree (see details below for how his wealth has suddenly ballooned to almost $7 million). Moore's stock greediness is trailed not far behind by Congresswoman Virginia Foxx (also see below), whose own stock trades were formerly said to outpace your average Congressperson. But Moore has far exceeded her. (Moore, who an eye blink ago was the self-serving Speaker of the NC House, carved out for himself a congressional District 14 added by the last Census, a safe seat to launch him on DeeCee where he could become even richer, ever shadier.)

Editorial Board, in the Raleigh News & Observer:

It should be obvious why members of Congress shouldn’t be allowed to trade stocks, but if more evidence is needed, consider the investing gusto of U.S. Rep. Tim Moore, a Republican representing North Carolina’s 14th District.

Moore, the former North Carolina House speaker from 2015 to 2025, is a U.S. House freshman, but he’s already surpassed all other members of the state’s congressional delegation in buying and selling stocks. 

A recent report by The News & Observer’s Washington correspondent Danielle Battaglia detailed Moore’s frequent trades. Between his taking office in January and mid-September, Moore made more than 150 trades. That was five times the trading activity of the next closest member in the delegation, Rep. Virginia Foxx, a Republican from Banner Elk, who made just over 30 trades in the same period. 

Good-government advocates have long called for a ban on members of Congress from owning or trading stocks. The members have security clearances, receive confidential briefings and have contacts in financial circles that create a situation ripe for insider trading. 

There was nothing about Moore’s trades that showed he acted on information unavailable to the public. However, his trades included investments in companies that could be affected by government actions on health care and tariffs. Even if a member’s trades are above board, the ownership of stock itself can affect how or whether the member votes.

Fortune magazine reported in June that Moore made hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of personal stock purchases shortly before and after President Donald Trump’s announcement of worldwide tariffs rattled the stock market in April. Moore failed to disclose the trades by a deadline required under the federal Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge (STOCK) Act, but he did submit a report within a 30-day grace period....

It stinks, doesn't it? That odor of opportunism running amok under the guise of public service.

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.

The Five New Republican Congressmen From NC

 

The NCGOP is calling them "the Fab Five of 2025" (if you can imagine Tim Moore as "fab" in any universe). Their sudden fulmination as freshmen owed everything to the powers of gerrymandering. For the record, here's a brief primer on who they are:

Pat Harrigan

Addison McDowell (NC-06) -- I made fun of him in the primary. (Also here.) He had no Democratic challenger in the General.

Mark Harris (NC-08) -- I made fun of him and covered extensively the election re-do in NC-09 his campaign caused in 2018. Too many individual posts to link. Use the Search button, top left.

Pat Harrigan (NC-10) -- Harrigan was interesting to me because of his initial willingness to criticize Tim Moore, going back to Nov. 2023, and challenge him in a primary for the newly created 14th CD, a district drawn expressly as an appropriate landing pad for Moore who had grown bored with Speaker of the NC House and needed more capacious real estate on which to deal and Capitol Hill would do just fine. Moore had a magic wand with the map-makers, and the new 14th would be a breeze. Then Pat Harrigan arrived out of nowhere. Early in November, with the candidate filling period looming the first week in December, Harrigan, an ex Green Beret who manufactures guns, bared his teeth at Moore: "Harrigan put a hard finger right on the bruise: Moore's corruption, including the domestic corruption of the marriage vows, was a matter of character. Harrigan out-and-out suggested that Moore has none" (JWW). Harrigan was right, incidentally.

Harrigan's righteous anger at public corruption was refreshing, coming from a Republican candidate in the Age of Trump. Maybe he's a standup guy with a sense of ethics, I mused. But then he looked like just an opportunist when he completely abandoned his interest in the 14th CD and switched over to file in the 10th CD minutes after Patrick McHenry announced his retirement. Harrigan beat an anointed business-type Republican in the primary.

Brad Knott (NC-13) -- A blank slate for me. I'll be watching.

Tim Moore (NC-14) -- The pudge who became an improbable sex avatar and who appears to be a giant sponge when it comes to free or loose money, offered by free or loose men. Too many posts to make choices. Use the Search engine at top of page.  

 

The Comedy Stylings of Berger/Moore

 

Berger and Moore ... said the governor has berated them for attacking the separation of powers doctrine when they are instead "seeking to preserve it."

--Haley Fowler, Law360

I was reading the details about the final legal briefs submitted to the North Carolina Court of Appeals in the matter of Cooper v. Berger (case number 24-440, civil suit over constitutionality of Senate Bill 382), and what leaped out at me was the audacious hypocrisy of Phil Berger and Tim Moore (headnote above), and their platoon of legal whizzes, to brazenly assert the opposite of the truth. S 382 strips Democrats, most especially Gov. Josh Stein, of the very executive powers we recently voted he get. S 382 essentially rewrites the job descriptions after the jobs are filled.

It's also a naked attempt for "legislative defendants" to control both the creation and the execution of the laws. That's against the state constitution, a pure-dee power-grab to cement the MAGA tribe's control of all aspects of the government including the courts and all the money under heaven.

"By enacting ... S.B. 382, legislative defendants make a mockery of the guardrails put in place by the people, shifting core executive powers like Monopoly pieces to whichever Council of State member currently enjoys their favor," Cooper's brief said.... "This approach is fundamentally inconsistent with constitutional government and individual liberty."

"...separating the powers accorded our state government by the people is foundational to our republican form of government," Cooper's brief said. "It is a fundamental guiding principle, enacted by the people to prevent tyranny."

Tyrants get away with defying truth -- and violating both law and ethics -- only by the consent of the governed.

The Head Bastard in the NC House Admits It

 

Speaker of the Republican-controlled NC House Tim Moore brazenly admitted to Steve Bannon that S 382, which the Republican House passed over Gov. Cooper's veto this week, is really all about taking control of the administration of elections to more generously guarantee that Republicans will never lose statewide races again. They don't mind admitting their schemes inside their own bubbles:

“This action item today is going to be critical to making sure North Carolina continues to be able to do what it can to deliver victories for Republicans up and down the ticket and move this country in the right direction,” Moore told Bannon on Wednesday on the latter's podcast.

No hell is hot enough for these enemies of the people.

S 382 has always and only been about putting the State Board of Elections under Republican control, and we all know what that will mean for fair elections, ballot access, and voter suppression -- mainly because we lived through what Boone lawyer Stacy Clyde Eggers IV ("Four") tried to do to student voters after Republican Pat McCrory won the governorship in 2012.

 

Naturally, They Want THIS Judge on the Case

 

I reported last October about several noxious laws the Republicans slipped into the state's budget bill, evidently hoping people wouldn't notice. We noticed. Among those terrible things, Phil Berger and Tim Moore gave themselves the power to pick 10 new "special" Superior Court judges -- no election or voice of the people required, just loyalty to the almighty power of the NCGOP.

That particular chicken has come home to roost. One of those 10 "special" judges became Clayton Somers, Speaker of the House Tim Moore's own former chief of staff.

Meanwhile, there happened a very contentious Republican primary in Rockingham County, where Phil Berger's planned gambling casino would have been located on land which had been conveniently (and just in time!) rezoned to allow for a gambling casino. One Republican county commissioner, Craig Travis, opposed all of the shenanigans, and campaigned against his fellow commissioner, Phil Berger's own son Kevin Berger. Travis almost beat Berger. Just 3 votes separated them when the dust settled.

Travis sued alleging that during the primary, other county commissioners and political organizations defamed him in attack ads stemming from his opposition to allowing a casino in Rockingham. So naturally, the defendants, including Kevin Berger, are petitioning to have the case tried by "special" Judge Clayton Somers, Tim Moore's BFF.

They don't even try to hide their corruption, nor mask it in any way. It's just business as usual. Give yourself the power to appoint the judges who will preside over your cases of corruption. The America of Donald Trump.

Some Primary Results -- US Congressional Races

 

Pat Harrigan

US House Dist. 1 -- Republican Laurie Buckhout beat husband-beater Sandy Smith

US House Dist. 5 -- Republican incumbent Virginia Foxx beat challenger Ryan Mayberry, taking almost 68% of the vote district-wide. But almost a third of Watauga County voted for Mayberry

US House Dist. 6 -- Republican runoff coming between top vote-getter Addison McDowell, who took 26% of the vote, vs. former congressman Mark Walker, who took 24%. Bo Hines placed 4th. May be the end of his political ambitions

US House Dist. 8 -- Republican preacherman Mark Harris, the center of the 2018 ballot-harvesting scandal, won 30% against 5 other candidates and thus avoids a runoff

US House Dist. 10 -- Republican firearms manufacturer Pat Harrigan won outright over establishment pick Grey Mills (endorsed by Virginia Foxx and Tim Moore and many other big names) and 3 other candidates, taking over 41% of the vote

US House Dist. 14 -- Republican NC House Speaker Tim Moore easily won his primary in a district that was drawn especially for him

Lassiter Lashes the Wind

 

Scott Lassiter and Mrs. Lassiter,
back then

Grateful to Bryan Anderson and his "Anderson Alerts" on Substack for being in the room to hear Republican candidate Scott Lassiter's BOE challenge to the residency of current Dems Senator Lisa Grafstein, who got gerrymandered into a Wake County double-bunking with another Democrat and chose to move her residence within the legal time frame to run in a different district that had no declared Democratic candidate.

To run against Scott Lassiter, as it turns out (or potentially, since he has his own primary to get through). 

Who is Scott Lassiter? Glad you asked.

Last heard from while suing House Speaker Tim Moore for alienation of affection (and eventually at least extracting some money or penance from Moore, for they settled out of court), Lassiter seems not to mind the public reminder of his cuckolding. Moore had pretty conclusively canoodled with Lassiter's wife, and got her some benefits in pay on the side. Lassiter testified that Moore had offered to bribe him to forget the whole thing at a Biscuitville in Raleigh (where there are three Biscuitvilles, so I'm guessing the Western Blvd. location).

At the Wake County BOE hearing, Grafstein produced bundles of evidence that she had moved her residence to the newly drawn NCS13, and had done so within the time required. Bryan Anderson, reporting from the hearing room: 

Scott Lassiter ... conceded that Grafstein appeared qualified to be on the ballot.

“I am impressed by the senator's records,” Lassiter said. “I'm impressed by the speed at which she was able to move.”

Lassiter told reporters after the hearing that he doesn’t plan to appeal the decision to the State Board of Elections.

“I do believe that the State Board would likely make the same decision,” Lassiter said. “Unless I have additional facts that come forward, I don’t anticipate appealing.”

So, if Grafstein's residency is legit, why did he bring the complaint? Simple answer, if you like watermelons squeezed through the birth canal of blueberries: Lassiter wants Grafstein thrown out of her current office representing NCS13, because she's now moved her residence outside the previous iteration of District 13 and is therefore some sort of imposter in the Senate.

The Wake BOE ruled Grafstein's residency legit and said the question of whether or not she is still a senator is not within their purview.

Scott Lassiter has to survive a primary against Vicki Harry, about whom I know nothing. Wonder how she'll try to defeat him.

Pat Harrigan Abandons His Moore Quest for a Surer Thing

 

Minutes after Patrick McHenry announced he would not be running for reelection to his 10th CD seat in Congress, Pat Harrigan, the very military man menacing Tim Moore's patented right to the 14th CD seat, which was created for him, announced that he was switching his campaign to the 10th and hiring McHenry's former campaign manager. Harrigan apparently has money. And maybe someone told him -- like McHenry? -- that Tim Moore can't be beat and he should pick another ripe plum instead.

Harrigan's Twitter feed.

Harrigan filed but not before another candidate, a nurse named Diana Jimison, got her name on the 10th CD ballot first. From appearances on her Facebook page, it appears that God is directing Jimison's campaign. She's a huge fan of Mark Robinson. For that matter, so is Pat Harrigan.

Sign of the Times

 

Seen on Twitter. Ad for Republican Pat Harrigan, running for Congress (CD14) in a primary against NC House Speaker Tim Moore.

Rumble in the 14th: The Tim Moore-Pat Harrigan Primary

 

“I think it’s going to be a nasty primary. I would be shocked if Harrigan does not continue to hit Moore and hit him hard. What I don’t know is what Moore’s reaction is going to be.”

--WCU Political Scientist Chris Cooper

Harrigan

Last Friday I was tickled to publish Pat Harrigan's attack on Speaker Tim Moore's entry into the Republican primary in the newly drawn, heavily Republican 14th Congressional District. I couldn't guess at the time the response that attack got in yesterday's headline by Danielle Battaglia in the News&Observer: "23 minutes passed before Speaker Tim Moore’s race for Congress turned ugly. What now?"

Harrigan's attack is considered "ugly"? Because the facts behind it are also ugly? Harrigan put a hard finger right on the bruize: Moore's corruption, including the domestic corruption of the marriage vows, is a matter of character. Harrigan out-and-out suggests that Moore has none. 

Battaglia reminded me that Harrigan's race in 2022 against Jeff Jackson in the previous 14th also turned "vitriolic," with Jackson landing the sharper blows and Harrigan complaining in the media. He's not going to take anything sitting down, plus he was clearly ready for the arrival of Tim Moore. According to Battaglia, Harrigan published his attack on Moore only 23 minutes after Moore's announcement (or his strategist Paul Shumaker's statement, since it was actually Shumaker who made the news that day. Moore plans a big campaign public launch next week).

True to the ethos that money is the only god, Moore's staged "soft launch" last Friday in Gaston County involved the ostentatious presentation of a giant check to Gaston Community College. Sharing the goodies is a good ole boy's signature.

Republican operative Paul Shumaker got to announce that Moore is indeed running for Congress, so it only makes sense that Shumaker also responded to the Harrigan attack -- with superior condescension: “My experience, which is a little bit more extensive in this than most people in politics, is that those who are behind and those that are desperate, tend to be the ones who lash out first.” No shit. We'll see if Harrigan is willing to go whole hog on Moore, who's actually a big, fat, self-satisfied sitting duck.

Tim Moore Enters Congressional Race Under Small Arms Fire

 

Late yesterday, Tim Moore's political strategist got to break the news that Moore will indeed be doing in 2024 what every sentient politico in the state knew he was going to do -- run for the newly drawn and personally crafted 14th CD seat, which includes his home county of Cleveland.

There's already a Republican candidate announced in that race, an ex-Green Beret named Pat Harrigan, who "welcomed" Moore to the contest with this statement:

Tagging Moore as a "casino activist" hardly scratches the surface, though bringing up his "legacy of corruption" at least gets us on the right map for evaluating Moore's outstanding qualities as a candidate. Harrigan on his website makes a point of evoking the West Point Honor Code, which he says is sorely needed for members of Congress and which Tim Moore would presumably fail miserably.

The contrast between Harrigan and Moore could launch multiple memes. Harrigan is a lean warrior and is running as a metaphorical Green Beret of conservative thought and action. He tells us that while still on active duty at Fort Bragg in North Carolina, he started a small arms business out of his doublewide which grew into an arms manufacturing business, ZRODELTA, which in 2018 opened a plant with 65 workers in Burke County just off I-40. A Republican arms manufacturer running for Congress ought to be pure catnip for the conservatives of the new 14th CD, especially when they consider the sinewy, sacrificing Harrigan next to the pudgy, self-interested Tim Moore.

 

Harrigan ran for this seat in 2022 against Jeff Jackson, who won with 58% in a district that was much more favorable for a Democrat. It's been radically redrawn, which led to Jackson's stepping aside to run for the statewide office of Attorney General. For a brief couple of weeks, Harrigan was the only Republican in the primary, but he was clearly anticipating the entrance of Tim Moore. He had that "Welcome to the Race" statement written and cued up well before the news of Moore's run hit the wires.

"To Undo What We’ve Done.” Tim Moore Mis-appoints a Crony

 

Isn't cronyism inherently corrupt? I feel obliged to at least try to keep up with the new scandals that continuously sprout wherever House Speaker Tim Moore treads. His plans for Congress are well known, though he continues to play bashful about actually running for the newly drawn 14th CD that includes his home in Gaston County. Everyone even partially warm to the touch knows he's lusted for a seat in Congress, which he's now describing as only one of his many options. "Had we but world enough and time, this coyness, Timmy, were no crime." 

Kenneth Robert "Rob" Davis

According to Speaker Moore's fellow NCGA member Sen. Danny Britt (Lumberton), Speaker Moore hisownself put a name on a five-page list of appointments to important state government jobs, in particular an old college buddy and long-time friend Kenneth Robert Davis (goes by "Rob"), appointed to the Disciplinary Hearing Commission of the State Bar. All those appointments got voted on last week. Reporter Bryan Anderson discovered that the Disciplinary Hearing Commission (just this last May) found that as a lawyer Rob Davis had "failed to maintain accurate identification of all funds in his trust account, had mismanaged client funds, and fell behind on filing and paying several years of state and federal income taxes."

Sen. Danny Britt fingered Tim Moore as behind the appointment, because the appointment itself has become toxic enough already that fellow Republican Britt --also closely connected to Rob Davis in local politics; Davis is a county attorney for Robeson -- needed someone to blame not named Danny Britt. Britt's conversation with reporter Anderson included this:

 

Britt said Davis’s appointment came directly from Speaker Moore, and that Davis hadn’t requested it.

“He had not requested to be placed on this committee,” Britt said. “It kind of came out of the blue to him. He didn’t request to serve on it, but he appreciates being asked to serve on the committee. … I did not know he was nominated until I saw it in the appointment bill language. I know for a fact it was Tim Moore’s decision to put him on there and nobody else’s.”

For his part, Moore ain't talking (at least not to Anderson), though he did issue a statement last Wednesday that "he’d revisit the appointment" (whatever that means ... sounds juicy!). In the meantime the legal community and others involved in civic government are gaping at the appointment of a metaphorical jailbird to the new role as jailer (as political scientist Chris Cooper put it). Even though he was willing to finger Moore as culprit, Britt wants to peddle the narrative that Davis's transgressions were just "a minor bookkeeping thing."

Sen. Danny Britt

Rob Davis was a Republican member of the Bladen County Board of Elections during the great ballot harvesting scandal of 2018 to benefit the Rev. Mark Harris's campaign for Congress in CD9. After the State Board of Elections conducted its investigation of McCrae Dowless and his activities, the SBOE vacated all the sitting members on county BOEs involved in the Dowless multi-county shenanigans, just for a clean slate, apparently, and not because everyone was guilty of something. NCGOP Chair (at the time), Robin Hayes, appealed to the SBOE to keep Davis on the board but was denied. Asked very recently by reporter Anderson, Hayes now sez he has no memory of Davis. “The name doesn’t even ring a bell.” Ouch.

Lawmakers won't be back in Raleigh until November 29. In the meantime, Davis's appointment to the Disciplinary Hearing Commission is officially the law. Anderson reports that Davis himself is quite aware of the embarrassment and is seeking legal advice on how best to handle it, or simply not take the job. "Yeah! That's the ticket,"sez Britt, who actually did say out loud that Davis could "just choose to not participate in any commission activities":

“If he doesn’t get seated, doesn’t go to any meetings, doesn’t participate, then he’s a nonparticipating member and that’s really no issue,” Britt said. “I don’t think there’s anything we can do between now and [November 29] to undo what we’ve done.”

How to deal with the wounds cut by corrupt politicians: If a public servant doesn't do his job, that's a solution for a corrupt appointment!

Famous For the Wrong Reason

 

Scott Lassiter sued House Speaker Tim Moore last June for cuckolding him. He claimed that Moore and his wife committed adultery over a period of three years that destroyed his marriage, a period of time that Lassiter's wife later characterized as "a nightmare." After much press speculation -- including Lassiter's claim that Moore admitted the affair to him at a Biscuitville and offered to bribe him to forget it -- Lassiter and Moore suddenly and unexpectedly "resolved" the alienation of affection claim (whatever a "resolution" means, since details remain secret), and Lassiter dropped his exceedingly rare lawsuit. Now Lassiter, a former Apex Town Council member, is running for the new 13th state Senate district in southern Wake County. The newly drawn SD 13 has no incumbent. The Civitas Partisan Index recently judged the district as a D+1"toss-up."

Lassiter works as an assistant principal for the national on-line Connections Academy, "a public school that focuses on helping students grow to be academically competent and behaviorally responsible." Lassiter also serves on the Wake Soil and Water Conservation District Board of Supervisors, and served on the Apex Town Council from 2011 to 2015" (WRAL).

Meanwhile, and like anyone warm to the touch would be surprised, Tim Moore actually admitted he was "thinking about" running for the 14th Congressional Dist., specifically drawn for him with no hindrance this year from a Madison Cawthorn. The shadiest of all General Assembly wheeler-dealers, Tim Moore will have vast new grazing rights in DeeCee. 

The End of Democracy in North Carolina

 

If it's not the end, we can see it from here.

There will be no two-party give-and-take in North Carolina until further notice. The Republican Party of Phil Berger will own it all, from steerage to stateroom, even if the other Republican Party of Mark Robinson wins the governorship, because Phil Berger and his boys have stripped this governor and any subsequent governor of much of their former power. (Robinson will have to be content as just a video sensation.) The courts, of course, will be no help to the rest of us looking for simple fairness. Justices Newby, Berger Jr., Barringer, Dietz, and Allen drove the final nail into fairness -- their ruling very recently that overturned the previous court's decision that partisan gerrymandering inherently violates the rights of voters. Unleashed by the Newby Court, Berger-Moore did (and will continue to do) as they pleased. 

They made themselves -- named in the law as "President Pro Tem of the Senate" and "Speaker of the House" -- heads of a super-secret investigative arm of the legislature known as "Gov Ops." Why do Mr. Berger and Mr. Moore get their own secret police? They also slipped it into the budget that each member of the General Assembly gets to decide which of their communications to hide and which to reveal -- the need to hide kinda screaming incipient corruption. 

They can be petty in their punishments: "Attorneys who work for Legal Aid of North Carolina—which helps low-income people navigate civil courts—can no longer participate in NC LEAF, a state program that helps public-interest lawyers pay their law school debt." They can be (and were) grandiose with their singular innovations: "The General Assembly also gives itself the ability to pick 10 special superior court judges, whom Newby can appoint to hear challenges to General Assembly laws and legislative districts." (Quotes from Jeffrey Billman) Berger-Moore also solidified their control of the commission that is hounding Democratic Justice Anita Earls. Bottomline: They will punish you if you're a problem for them. Hence the sudden interference in how Watauga elects its county commission.

Did I say corruption? It's actually out in the open. Under new provisions in the Republican budget, lobbyists in Raleigh can pay $2,000 each for the privilege of  “expedited entry” into the Legislative Office Building and State Legislative Building. Lobbyists for state agencies pay a reduced $1,000 for that privilege. Please exit through the gift shop. 

When Democrats held absolute power, they also became corrupt. It's an inevitable development for any group that gets so powerful and dominant that they have no credible, let alone organized, challenge to their dictatorial power, no guardrails of a vigilant court system, no debates or the informed backing of the people. Who can resist the corruption, that tickling of flattery and tinkling of coin? And how do you fight it, when its power is unchecked and apparently limitless?

Tim Moore: 'It Was Phil's Fault!'

 

Well, granted, Tim Moore didn't say it that directly. No, he was pussyfooting but also being bold perhaps in the knowledge that he won't be Speaker for much longer. So pointing out the failures of Phil Berger may seem less taboo (or not seem like you're just begging for a beating). 

Republican Senate leader Berger sprang the gambling casino language in the state budget and many members of his own party felt blindsided, especially in Tim Moore's House of Reps, and despite what Tim Moore may have promised Berger beforehand -- that he could deliver the House to legalize casino gambling -- he couldn't deliver the House, and Berger lashed out at him as an unreliable partner, and then Speaker Moore took a small measure of revenge when he spoke with reporters very recently and pointed the finger of blame in the general direction of Mr. Berger: “The way that it was done, the way in not going through a committee process like we did on the sports betting, I think – like you used the word earlier ‘doomed’ it -- I think it did.” That's tortured language to say what you're a little bit afraid of saying out loud, that it's all Phil Berger's fault that casino gambling didn't get legalized in North Carolina in 2023. The Fixer couldn't fix it because of his own arrogance. Berger had been dictatorial and brazen with the budget fiasco, because General Assembly rules mandate that the budget gets voted on as an all-or-nothing proposal, meaning once it’s on the floor for a vote there are no amendments allowed. Many of Moore's House Republicans didn't like that one bit.

“There were people who probably would have supported it as a standalone bill who just felt like the way it was being done and not having any input in it, didn’t work,” said Speaker Moore.

But as some smart people have already predicted, and Tim Moore certainly agrees, casino gambling ain't really dead, because they believe it will reemerge in some new duds in next year's General Assembly session, and Phil Berger has already signaled that will happen. When Berger comes again with his prize package, he'll figure out how to buy off all that conservative opposition, and he'll have plenty of PAC money to do it.

Some More Toys Berger-Moore Gave Themselves in the New Budget

 

Another provision slipped into the state budget follows the established theme: More power specifically for Senate President Pro Tem Phil Berger and Speaker of the House X (whoever follows Tim Moore -- Destin Hall, a contender -- because Moore is retiring). In this case, it's power to operate what amounts to a secret police. That boils down to the Power to Torture. For reals! The following specific applications were compiled by Crooks and Liars -- bludgeons given to a committee chaired and controlled by Berger-Moore:

The Joint Legislative Committee on Government Operations (Gov Ops for short), is  empowered to seize “any document or system of record” from anyone who works in or with state and local government during its investigations. The rule applies to contractors, subcontractors, and any other non-state entity “receiving, directly and indirectly, public funds,” including charities and state universities.

Gov Ops staff will be authorized to enter “any building or facility” owned or leased by a state or non-state entity without a judicial warrant. This includes the private residences of subcontractors and contractors who run businesses out of their homes.

Public employees under investigation will be required to keep all communication and requests “confidential.” They cannot alert their supervisor of the investigation nor consult with legal counsel. Violating this rule “shall be grounds for disciplinary action, including dismissal,” the law reads. Those who refuse to cooperate face jail time and fines of up to $1,000. In the event that Gov Ops searches a person’s home, these rules mean that the person 1) must keep the entry a secret, 2) cannot seek outside help (unless necessary for fulfilling the request, the law says), and 3) could face criminal charges if Gov Ops deems them uncooperative.

The killer clause is the secrecy that a target of investigation is supposed to maintain. That's police state shit right there. They want you isolated from any help, let alone sympathy.

The Next Really Bad, Truly Awful Elections Bill in North Carolina

 

Senate Bill 749, "An Act To Revise the State Board of Elections," is another Republican power grab, denying the governor any -- as in no -- appointment power to the SBOE (and that's not even the worst part). Instead, this is who will get to appoint the new eight-member state board:

President of the Senate (Phil Berger) gets to appoint 2

Speaker of the House (Tim Moore) gets to appoint 2

Minority Leader of the Senate (Dan Blue) gets to appoint 2

Minority Leader of the House (Robert T. Reives II) gets to appoint 2

These same four people will also be burdened with appointing one member each to every single county BOE in the state come next June. So you get the plan? Four-to-4 on the SBOE; 2-to-2 on county BOEs. Everybody appointed by politicos. Can you spell deadlock? How about clusterfuck?

And what does S749 say about deadlocks? What are the remedies? In only two very specific types of deadlock -- the failure of boards to agree on their own chair -- Berger/Moore give themselves extraordinary power. If a local BOE can't agree on a chair, Berger-Moore gets to swoop in and take control:

If for any reason a chair is not elected within 30 days after new appointees take the prescribed oath or within 30 days of the occurrence of a vacancy in the office of the chair, the office of chair may be filled by legislative appointment in accordance with G.S. 120-121 as if the chair is a member of a board or commission. If the vacancy occurs in an odd-numbered year, the appointment is made upon the recommendation of the President Pro Tempore of the Senate. If the vacancy occurs in an even-numbered year, the appointment is made upon the recommendation of the Speaker of the House of Representatives.

Same thing if the SBOE can't get majority agreement on a new Executive Director.

What about deadlocks over entire voting plans by county -- the setting of hours, the placement of early voting sites, the handling of challenges? Deadlocks over those highly contentious issues, since they involve something as crucial as ballot access itself, ought to happen, must happen, when one side has a plan that will disadvantage voters of color and young people. The greatest fear on the left is weak board members who just want to get along, so they go along, and through their shocking innocence allow the suppression of the right to vote.

The Republicans tout S749 as "no partisan control of voting." and doesn't it sound just so splendidly bi-partisan, with equal numbers from both parties singing Kum ba yah in the best of all possible worlds? If the Republican messaging machine is good at anything it's goodest at pulling the wool. They want deadlocks. They don't mind a little court action since they own the state's judiciary too. 

NOTE

S749 has passed the Senate and is moving in the House. It will pass. It will be vetoed. The veto will be overridden. The governor will sue.

FURTHER NOTE

The Republicans had this very same power-grab twice rejected in court and again by VOTERS, when they put a Constitutional Amendment on the ballot in 2018 seeking the same outcome that S749 provides.

Republicans Are Better at Seduction

At 5 a.m. Sunday morning, Kate Kelly and David Perlmutt posted a long piece in the NYTimes (in the Business section, of all places, which is why I didn't see it until Carolina Forward tweeted it out) -- about how the Republicans wooed and won the tragic defection of Tricia Cotham. It was Republican bigwigs Speaker Tim Moore and Majority Leader John Bell who reached out and encouraged her into her "comeback" campaign last year, without expecting -- they ludicrously claim -- that she would in fact change parties. Moore and Bell said they wanted Cotham back because she had been an excellent member of the House from 2007 to 2016, but we know the predator in Moore detected a weakness for flattery. He poured it on.

Meanwhile (back story), Cotham had been very publicly sick with COVID. In February 2022, Cotham put out a TikTok confession (“This is my third time battling COVID. Yes, the third time. And before you jump to conclusions, yes, I’m fully vaccinated and boosted,” she said. “I’m in a lot of pain. My lungs hurt. I’m mentally drained”). That went viral in her district, especially after WSOC reporter Joe Bruno interviewed her on camera.

So partly (largely?) because of that plague narrative, when it came time for the Dist. 112 Democratic candidate recruitment committee to begin approaching prospective candidates for what was sure to be a Democratic pickup in a newly drawn House district with a distinct Democratic majority, they did not automatically think of Tricia Cotham. Three other Democrats had filed for the 2022 primary when Cotham arrived on the last day of filing and put her name in too, which ought to have been and probably was a clear warning to Democrats that she was a gathering thunderstorm of raw feelings.

"She fumed that Lillian’s List, an abortion rights organization, had 'really screwed' her by endorsing another Democrat in the primary," and Jonathan Coby, her former campaign consultant, said she had already developed a bunker mentality, an "us-versus-them" defensiveness toward Democratic interest groups. A former advocacy director at the Charlotte-based Latin American Coalition -- who had been a friend of Cotham's for years -- said Cotham “felt she did not get the gratitude or spotlight that she felt she deserved,” and added, “she was jealous that other Democrats were getting the adulation from the party.”

Ms. Cotham told Mr. Coby and her mother [Mecklenburg Co. commish Pat Cotham] that she was put off that Democrats treated her as a newcomer when she returned to the House, inviting her to freshman orientation and offering her a mentor. She declined both.

Instead, that charmer Tim Moore designated Cotham as a part of his "honor escort," "a small group of lawmakers who escorted Mr. Moore to the dais to be sworn in as speaker." Her seduction was pretty much a done deal.

Do You Smell Corruption When Tim Moore Is On the Premises?

 

Long story, short (with gratitude to Danielle Battaglia, of the NandO):

In 2022, House Speaker Tim Moore induced House Budget Chair Jason Saine to write in a new budgeted position for the courts system in the counties of Cleveland and Lincoln (the home counties of Tim Moore and Jason Saine, respectively), "trial court administrator," a new job which promptly went to a former employee of Moore's Kings Mountain law firm along with a $13,000 bump in salary.

The Administrative Office of the Courts (AOC) did not ask for the new position in their budget requests:

Only eight of North Carolina’s judicial districts have trial court administrators and they tend to have a high volume of cases. The others are Wake, Durham, Mecklenburg, Guilford, Forsyth and Cumberland counties and the district that encompasses Granville, Franklin, Person, Warren and Vance counties. 

Cleveland and Lincoln counties’ combined population of 193,765 is smaller than that of the other seven districts that have the position, whose populations range from 236,679 to 1.18 million.

Jason Saine

Tim Moore wouldn't speak to Battaglia about this news, but Jason Saine did speak in a way that might identify him as Moore's useful idiot and as a defense attorney's worst client. In trying to explain how a new high-salaried position got into the budget and how Tim Moore's close personal friend landed the job, Saine more or less defined "political corruption" for all of us:

“The local judges and court people were asking for it [a new trial court admin], and I realize AOC might not have requested it, but (the judges) are close to me and the speaker,” Saine said. “I don’t think it’s a big story; it’s just, yeah, turns out that’s how politics works: the proximity to talk to people who are in politics, and our districts do OK.”

We get it. Access = "doing OK."

Saine couldn't shut up:

“Tim interacts with the courthouse much more than I do,” Saine said, while struggling to explain who specifically requested the position. “It was one of those things that I was like OK, fine. That’s good with me. Whatever. They had a reason to justify it, and that was what it was.”

Asked why Cleveland or Lincoln received the positions while other counties were left without them, Saine responded: “Because I’m the budget writer and he’s the speaker. It goes into the budget for our areas and we’re able to see it through. It’s politics. I think readers would be shocked otherwise."

Not shocked any more by the obvious corruption, and by now only mildly annoyed that this sort of thing comes with zero consequences for any of the manipulators.