North Carolina Is the New Wisconsin And it's got both ingredients- Koch and voter suppression
North Carolina is the new Wisconsin, but not for the reasons McCrory alleges. Like in Wisconsin, a homegrown grassroots resistance movement has emerged—and grown rapidly—to challenge the drastic right-wing agenda unveiled by Republicans in the state. Just like the Koch brothers backed Scott Walker, the Koch’s billionaire ally and close associate Art Pope funded North Carolina’s Republican takeover in 2010 and 2012. (Only McCrory went a step further and actually named Pope to his inner circle as deputy budget director.) And North Carolina, like Wisconsin, is “a state fight with national implications,” says Rev. William Barber of the North Carolina NAACP. Republicans have imported a slew of ALEC-inspired policies in an attempt to turn the New South back into the Old Confederacy.
Melissa Harris-Perry covered the North Carolina “Moral Monday” movement extensively on her MSNBC show last Saturday. I was one of the panelists.
In a few months since taking over power for the first time in one hundred years, North Carolina Republicans have passed or introduced legislation that would: eliminate the earned income tax credit for 900,000; decline Medicaid coverage for 500,000 and privatize public healthcare in the state; end unemployment benefits for 165,000 in a state with the country’s fifth-highest unemployment rate; cut pre-K for 30,000 kids while shifting $90 million from public education to voucher schools; cut taxes for the top 5 percent while raising taxes on the bottom 95 percent; allow for guns to be purchased without a background check and carried in parks, playgrounds, restaurants and bars; do away with public financing of judicial races; prohibit death row inmates from challenging racially discriminatory verdicts; and on it goes. (Unlike in Wisconsin, North Carolinians have no collective bargaining rights to protect).
In order to make it harder for opponents of these right-wing policies to challenge their sponsors, North Carolina Republicans have unloaded the kitchen sink of voter suppression. As I reported in April (“7 Ways North Carolina Republicans are Trying to Make it Harder to Vote”): “North Carolina Republicans have introduced a series of bills in the legislature that would require state-issued photo ID to cast a ballot, drastically cut early voting, eliminate same-day voter registration, end straight-ticket voting, penalize families of students who register to vote where they go to college, rescind the automatic restoration of voting rights for ex-felons, and ban “incompetent” voters from the polls. The legislation has been dubbed the ‘Screw the Voter Act of 2013’ and ‘The Longer Lines to Vote Bill.’ The goal is to make this racially integrated swing state a solidly red bastion for the next decade and beyond.”
http://www.thenation.com/blog/174761/north-carolina-new-wisconsin
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Our message to North Carolina's GOP: 'Moral Mondays' are here to stay
Since extreme conservatives took over the Republican party in the state capitol, nonviolent direct action became our only
option
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'Moral Monday' protesters crowd the gallery in the legislative general assembly building in Raleigh, North Carolina.
We have been pleased by the number of people showing up at the statehouse in Raleigh, North Carolina every Monday, sacrificing their freedom and their bodies to protest the regressive agenda of the extreme right. But we are not surprised.
We have worked since 2005, when 20,000 civil rights warriors across the state elected me to lead the NC NAACP, the largest NAACP conference in the American south. Since 2007, we have mobilized thousands of whites, blacks and Latinos; gay and straight, to come to the statehouse to show their support for a progressive 14-point "people's agenda" that is rooted in anti-racism, anti-poverty, and anti-war. We organize every day. We do this with tens of thousands of volunteers and only a handful of staff.
When far-right extremists took over the Grand Old Party and turned it into a joyless, humorless, mean-spirited vehicle to line the pockets of the super-rich, we already had experience bringing people to Jones Street, where the state capitol is located, and advocating for the poor and vulnerable. It is not surprising, then, that a couple of months ago, when we called for moral witnesses based on Gandhi and Dr King's brilliant examples of nonviolent direct action, we had 17 ministers and other leaders answer the call and participate in the first inaugural "Moral Monday".
We were pleased, but not shocked, when 29 additional North Carolinians came the second Monday; 49 the third, 59 the fourth, and 151 last Monday, 3 June. Each week, the number of supporters multiplies; from about 300 the first week to more than 4,000 on 3 June.
The appeal for each Moral Monday has been the same: urging legislators to govern for the good of the whole, rather than for the wealthy. We didn't come to this decision lightly. In fact, we made several attempts to meet with the far-right legislative leadership. Governor Pat McCrory invited us to his house for a 20-minute chat. We said we wanted to work with him to be sure he governed for the good of the whole, as the US constitution requires him to do. But it was clear he was marching to the beat of a different drummer.
Since then, we have tried repeatedly to meet with legislative leaders. No luck. Once they refused to meet and refused to stop their destructive campaign, we had no choice but to commit our constitutional responsibility to instruct our legislators by engaging in nonviolent civil disobedience.
Week after week, North Carolinians from all walks of life have come to Raleigh to exercise their constitutional right to "instruct" their representatives. Instead, they were arrested for trespassing in the "people's house". To date, over 300 people have been arrested and thousands have lifted their voices in opposition to the avalanche of extreme public policies. The measures include:
• Cutting the payroll tax credit for over 900,000 poor and working people
• Slashing state unemployment benefits and rejecting federally-funded Emergency Unemployment Compensation to 170,000 laid-off workers
• Rejecting federal funds to expand Medicaid to cover 500,000 North Carolinians without health insurance
In sum, the NC general assembly is making it harder for those who are sick to get healthcare; for children to get an education; for the incarcerated to be redeemed; for people to vote. At the same time, they make it easier for the rich to get richer; for the sick to get sicker; for private schools to profit while cutting funds for public schools; to implement the flawed death penalty; and to get guns.
But as Paul said, in the book of 2 Corinthians 4:8:
"We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not in despair."
We have the cause of justice on our side and we will continue to move forward together and not one step back. In the words of Penda Hair, co-director at Advancement Project:
"We are prepared to fight these ugly attacks on the poor, on public education, and on the voting rights of minorities, aged, and students with every organizing and legal strategy at our disposal."
We are building a movement, not just a moment. As our coalition and supporters grow, we will continue to shine a spotlight on injustice and go back home to our respective communities and organize against the regressive agenda of North Carolina's legislative leadership.
