News & Observer: As Gov. Cooper and others offer ideas, where is the GOP agenda for a better North Carolina?

Republican-backed bills in the North Carolina General Assembly paints an all too familiar picture of how Republicans on both the national and state level are pushing forth their own agenda.

In the NCGA’s latest session, Republicans have put forth bills targeting the state’s transgender and gender-nonconforming communities, North Carolinians right to vote, and pushing a tax change for PPP loans that would give lawmakers like House Speaker Tim Moore, a tax break.

Five years after the state’s notorious House Bill 2, Republican legislators introduced several discriminatory bills; SB 514, SB 515, and HB 358, that mirror the more than 100 anti-trans bills that have been introduced in legislatures across the country.

Following in the footsteps of the coordinated national effort to keep our communities, particularly people of color, from exercising their constitutional right to vote, Republicans are pushing for Senate Bills 326 and 377, which will continue their long tradition of stripping away access to the ballot box from eligible North Carolina voters.

While NC Republicans are focused on attacking our constitutional rights and violating our personal liberties, Governor Roy Cooper and Democrats have been advocating for investments in schools and teachers, Medicaid expansion, protecting and expanding voting rights, passing LGBTQ-inclusive bills and legislation that aims to combat Black maternal mortality.

With Gov. Cooper and Democrats pushing for common sense reforms, it’s all too clear that the NC GOP is desperately attempting to hold onto power by any means, regardless of our communities’ need for relief, our state’s recovery or the impact their discriminatory bills cause. 

Bottom Line: When it comes to increasing political gains over the well-being of North Carolinians, Republicans are all too quick to ignore the needs of their constituents in pursuit of power.

As a recent News & Observer editorial states, “What Republicans want to do with that power to benefit the state and nation now and for tomorrow is a mystery, perhaps even to them”.