- [Anna] North Carolina's House speaker says he'll not seek a new term in leadership, and millions of dollars are pouring in for North Carolina's leading gubernatorial candidates.

This is "State Lines" - [Announcer] Quality public television is made possible through the financial contributions of viewers like you who invite you to join them in supporting PBS NC.

[upbeat energetic music] - Welcome to State Lines.

I'm Anna Beavon Gravely filling in this week.

Joining me today is Dawn Vaughan of "The News & Observer", representative Brandon Lofton of Mecklenburg County, Senator Amy Galey of Alamance in Randolph Counties, and the North State Journal's, Matt Mercer.

Welcome to the show guys.

- Thank you.

- Thank you.

- Last week speaker Tim Moore announced he would not be seeking reelection as North Carolina General Assembly speaker in 2025.

Speaker Moore is the longest running speaker in North Carolina history, having served five two year terms.

Dawn, is this something that we can expect moving forward for speakers to have a longer reign of 10 years or is this a truly just record setting?

- I think that people have over the years come to expect that it's Speaker Moore and it's Senate leader Berger and that's who's been in charge the whole time I've been covering state government so I could see the next speaker wanting to serve that length of time and become the face of the majority chamber.

But you have to have support and it's a different type of election where you're trying to get the votes within your own party, within your own caucus, and all the other factions as opposed to your district.

So if you can get that support and there's a couple different people who are already in the house that we think would probably be the ones that wanna follow more.

- Matt, do we see that there's gonna be a lot of vying to be the next speaker or is it really sort of a next in line situation?

- So this is actually a story that we've been working on with North Star Journal next week.

There's really three names you hear talked about a lot in the building and that's majority leader John Bell, appropriations chair Jason Saine and Rules Chair Destin Hall.

We were actually spoke to all three of them about this recently and they were able to kind of play coy to an extent that they didn't want to step on Speaker Moore's announcement.

But I think something that Representative Bell said was he doesn't anticipate a kind of knockdown drag out fight for it at that they'll kind of talk amongst themselves for what the caucus wants to kind of avoid the the shots fired back and forth as you've seen in previous elections for leadership.

- Senator Galey, what are you hearing from this on the different side of the chamber?

What are your thoughts?

- Well, I think that the three gentlemen that he just mentioned a really great quality leaders.

Any of the three of them would do a great job leading the house.

I think that, going back to your question to Dawn about is this record setting, I think people don't really understand the toll that service in the general assembly can take.

Especially from my observation, those who are in leadership and in the corner offices it looks like a very grueling, very difficult job.

And it doesn't surprise me that... Or wouldn't surprise me if a person wanted to step back after a few years at the role just because it is exhausting to be sort of in the middle of that mix for so much intensity.

- Yeah, that's a great point.

Representative Lofton, when we look at the long tenure, the exhaustion that it takes, is there probably some energy around term limits around leadership positions?

Not necessarily for legislators themselves but for leadership positions?

- Yeah, I haven't heard much discussion in terms of term limits for leadership.

What I have heard is, especially within our caucus, is that our hope is that we have a speaker who's committed to rules that allow for full debate and we are able to actually have full debate on important issues.

We had a number of instances this past session in previous sessions where that's been less than the standard.

And so I think our hope going forward is that for the important issues facing our state we have rules that permit as much debate as possible.

- So Dawn, going back to the rules that permit conversation in the list of potentials for the next speaker.

Are you hearing that there there's gonna be a continuation of Speaker Moore's tenure and his reign, more of like a overall feeling?

Or is there gonna be a shift to make it their own?

- I think Hall, Saine, and Bell all have elements of Speaker Moore's personality.

Saine might be more like the social aspect that Moore clearly is Hall is much more reserved, but it's Rolls...

He's Rolls chair.

I believe Moore was Rolls chair before and you're kind of...

It's a different role that's not as public facing.

You're all the behind the scenes deciding what moves or not.

And the public doesn't always see that.

The press doesn't always see that.

And Bill is kind of in the middle there as majority leader.

He doesn't...

I had him on my "Under the Dome" podcast a couple weeks ago and he said he makes jokes about people other lawmakers wanting to get in front of the camera and that's not his thing as much, but it is part of the job because you're basically the spokesperson for your party in that chamber if you're in the majority or if you're in the minority party.

And I've noticed that Moore and Democratic leader Reeve's relationship has been a little bit different in this session than in past sessions.

It started off maybe a little more collegial and Reeves and Hall versus what you were saying representative, about things changing now with debate.

And obviously that shifted once the super majority shifted.

- Matt, Senator Galey talked a little bit about the fatigue.

Do you think that's gonna factor in to the long list of individuals that are interested in running and really just the fatigue in general of being a lawmaker with redistricting and the complicated dynamic between voters and elected officials.

Is that an element do you think?

- I think it certainly plays a part.

I think when you're looking at taking on kind of that next step in that role, there is a very public facing part, but also managing your caucus growing it and continuing to hold a majority.

I think you're looking at, you know, you need to be involved in campaign strategy and candidate recruitment but also managing the day to day.

And I think each one of them would kind of say, You know, I can do it.

But the question is, do they want to or they will they strike a deal where someone will serve for say maybe two or three terms and then kind of anoint the next person in line?

You know, I think the question is going back to I think the question over term limits is does North Carolina move towards a model like Florida where there are very strict term limits and they kind of designate things a session at a time or a continued nationalization where a speaker.

Until they lose a majority at some point.

- It's official.

We have a true sneak peek at our much anticipated 2024 Gubernatorial Race.

Campaign finance numbers have been reported and Democrat Attorney General Josh Stein raised nearly $6 million.

Republican Lieutenant Governor Mark Robinson raised $2.2 million.

Matt, coming back to you.

It sort of feels like we're talking about monopoly money when we talk about these campaign finance reports.

What is that gonna foreshadow for the 2024 cycle?

- It's unprecedented.

We're looking at the calendar is still very much 2023 and these candidates are raising millions of dollars.

I think to start with Attorney General Josh Stein, he is the heir to, or the money machine that Roy Cooper's built over the last eight years and he'll carry significant financial advantages through a primary, which I believe he'll win, and then to the general election.

Meanwhile, on the Republican side with Mark Robinson, he's raised, I think more than any Republican candidate for governor has raised at this point in history.

But he also is facing competition.

And I think, you know, with the entry this week of former Senator Andy Wells, I think it just helps Robinson kind of cement his status if you, now there's more candidates in the race and he has a base that very much on, like we see on a national scene with former President Donald Trump in the Republican primary, he's got a base that no one else is gonna move off of him.

And so the question is how do these candidates kinda break through when they're not going to have the backing that Robinson has already built up?

- Senator Galey, being both you and Representative Lofton have a unique experience at this table, having to fundraise and build your coffers as well, what does this tell you with the amount of money that we're talking about here?

- I think that the candidates who have announced have been working really, really hard.

I was very impressed to hear that Representative John Harvester, who is running for labor commissioner, has raised somewhere around $250,000, which compared to the gubernatorial races is not that much but for a council of state race this early, way before filing, I think that is a remarkable accomplishment.

And I think it's a reflection on how well Representative Harvester is liked and that people are very confident in his ability to lead.

- That's a great point.

We talked about the gubernatorial candidates, but are there some other candidates that you've been impressed by, Representative Lofton?

- Yes.

Yes, I've been impressed by my seatmate, Representative Wesley Harris, who's running for a state treasurer.

I think he is working very hard every day.

As was mentioned where we talked about it takes a lot of work everyday to raise that amount of money.

I think the amount of money we're seeing in the gubernatorial race reflects the fact that there's a lot at stake.

I mean, we're a purple state, we have more unaffiliated voters than Democrats or Republicans and so I think what's at stake in terms of who's in the governor's mansion, but also the seats we have in the House and the Senate will determine whether we have the kind of compromise and balance we need or whether we'll have single party rule, and I think that's what's at stake at this election.

- Yeah, I think you bring up a great point about unaffiliated voters.

North Carolina being one of nine states where unaffiliated voters outnumber Republicans and Democrats and the cost of elections we know has contributed to just the fact that you have to talk to more people and push them into different categories.

What kind of outside money do we think we're gonna see if this is what we have so far?

- I think we're gonna see a lot of outside money and I think that's what we're seeing with the front runners in the governor's race.

And it's always gonna be more money unless it's just a state or a race that no one cares about.

It's always gonna be unprecedented levels 'cause it's more and more money, right?

So Stein, I think it's around 6 million, Robinson around 2 million.

I talked to State Treasurer Falwell, he's also running for governor in the Republican primary this week.

He said he has over a million cash on hand, I think.

I agree certainly Harvester and Harris are probably the highest profile, current state lawmakers running for council at state offices.

But what Falwell told me this week when I was talking to him about a story I did on how the legislature is working to weaken more governor power, so why do you wanna be governor if this is the way North Carolina doesn't give the governor a lot of power?

And Falwell pointed out, he said, "My party", his Republican party, "is third."

He said it's third place.

If you look at the numbers it's unaffiliated than Democrats and Republicans as far as registrations, but that doesn't mean that most people are independent and change their mind every election.

And then the next line is Democrats and the next line is Republicans.

All those unaffiliated voters one of the reasons they're unaffiliated is you don't have to pick a party to vote in the primary.

So it might be a consistent Republican voter that just doesn't want a party telling them what to do, and the same thing for a consistent Democratic voter.

But those lines, depending on the election, is how things swing back and forth with the purple state.

So Robinson, as you were saying has a lot of the base, but is he gonna win statewide?

That's a much different election than a primary.

And that's, I think, what we've seen more of in these past elections is who wins your party's primary is a lot different than when you're looking at the millions of voters and the ones who we don't know how they're gonna vote.

Although if you look at the data like how a county votes, it falls along the general lines consistently.

But those few thousand votes I think is what makes North Carolina such an important state.

- Definitely dynamic for sure.

Matt, when we look at the fact that General Assembly is continuing to strip powers away from the governor, why would people be spending this amount of money to run for a position with stripped powers?

- I think you live in a nice mansion and you get troopers following you around.

You know, that's certainly is fun.

But I think the thing to worry about for Josh Stein is he would continue a lot of the same policies that Governor Cooper has, but I don't know that, based on his previous runs for attorney general where he's barely won both times, does he attract that split ticket voter the way that Roy Cooper did?

I think if you look at, there were a lot of split ticket voters in 2020 where Roy Cooper wins by a five point margin and Republicans win most of the other races including a sweep of the judicial races.

So, I think that's very much a question and he'll definitely have the resources to make his case and you know, we'll see kind of how the campaign unfolds during the primaries and then for a very expensive general election.

- Three election bills still linger in the house.

They include changes to voter identification, polling observers, and how election board members are chosen.

99 types of student and government IDs have been approved for use for the 2024 election.

It comes on the heels of a state Supreme Court ruling that reinstated voter ID requirements.

Representative Lofton, there's a lot of moving pieces leading up to the 2024 election.

Some new messaging is coming out, some new things being implemented, how can we expect that and what are the expectations for all hundred counties?

- Yeah, so my expectation, or the way I approach.

Election bills, basically starting from the point that elections are how we hold a government accountable and so we need to be skeptical and closely scrutinize any changes to the rules for how those elections are conducted.

And taken together, all three of these bills, for me, raise pretty serious concerns.

One would change and throw out perfectly valid absentee ballots if they happen to be received one or two days after the election day which is a departure from current law.

The second one would vastly overhaul our State Board of Elections and our county boards of elections so instead of them being a appointed by the governor, they would be appointed by the leaders of the parties within the State House and the state Senate and then down to the county level.

So you'd have, and they would also be two two at the county level and four four state level which would increase the likelihood for division deadlock.

And then third, it would allow parties to appoint these observers which is current law but the new bill would give them, I think what they call it, freely roam or to move freely within the voting enclosure and get as close as five feet from voters who are in the process of voting and overhear conversations about where the voter lives and their name.

These things cause me concern.

They're things that cause state or election officials across the state concerned.

They sent a letter to the legislature, this is a bipartisan group, Democrats and Republicans who have raised red flags about this bill and I think we need to pause and take a close look at this.

- Senator Galey, I am struck by and also reading in preparation for this, just how many new boards of election members have been voted across the state.

I think 99 counties had new election board members.

What does that say to you?

- Well, it's no doubt that we have a lot of trouble getting people to volunteer for positions all across state government and local government.

And they're all very, can be very time consuming from the Park and Rec Board in Graham, the municipality Graham up to the Board of Adjustment or the Board of Equalization and Review.

Those are all really important positions that can take a lot of time and people can just get tired of it and want to move on to other things.

Like I was saying about leadership in the general assembly, you know, it can be hard.

I wanna go back to what Representative Lofton said about for one, about absentee ballots being required under the new law to be received by election day.

That is the law in quite a number of states including states that are led by Democrats such as Minnesota and Delaware and Maine.

And so, that is not a radical idea that election day is election day.

Back in the 1970s, I would go with my mom and stand there when she went into the voting booth and pulled the curtain and voted and she had to vote in person on election day.

And our country got through pretty well as far as getting the votes counted and nobody cried that it wasn't fair and all of that.

I think that having election day be election day is not a farfetched to radical idea.

I think it's common sense.

Second, the suggested changes to the Board of Elections and having the majority leader and the minority leader in each chamber appoint a equal number of members to the State Board of Elections, I think that's amazing.

I think it's an amazing opportunity for the Minority party in the General Assembly to have a true voice.

I don't think there's any place in state government where the minority party in the general assembly is given actual power and that's immense.

And I think that the idea that, oh, we can't do that because it's not fair, how is it fair to have one party control the entire election apparatus and the other party have essentially very little say in what rules are made.

You know, we have the ability to pass laws obviously, but then as we have seen, they can be undermined by these collusive settlements that partisan Attorney General can jump into with the State Board of elections.

So I think that it is an amazing and revolutionary idea in North Carolina to have both parties have equal say in who's running the boards of elections.

And then as far as the poll observers, I mean, their ability to observe has to be meaningful.

Just having them in the room doesn't mean that they're able to watch and five feet is pretty far away.

I don't think anybody is intimidated by having to be five feet away.

I'm not sure how far Dawn and I are apart but I would say it's probably close to five feet, something like that.

So I think that those are common sense, reasonable laws that will help restore confidence in both parties in our elections.

A recent poll I think showed that only about 50% of North Carolinians have confidence, and that's both parties, have confidence that our elections are gonna be run in a fair manner where the vote tally is gonna be counted inaccurately.

- Go ahead, yeah.

- So I would just want to, I guess, emphasize a couple of things.

Yes, it is true that there are a number of other states that have this rule with the absentee ballot cutoff.

But in North Carolina, we have had the ability for those absentee ballots to come in three days after the election and that's been in place for a while and then elections have run, they've run well and been accurate.

And so again, my principle is because elections are how we hold our government accountable, any change we make, we need to make sure we pause, we receive input, we have public input, we thoroughly vet the idea to examine the consequences both intended and unintended.

And in this situation, it's not me, it's not partisan activist crying or claiming unfairness, it's election officials, it's Board of Election officials raising this concern that this is going to have unintended consequences.

That these changes are going to undermine faith in our elections and undermine the integrity of our elections.

These aren't my words, these are the words from people who are on the ground, both Republicans and Democrats from large and small counties.

With those concerns, those red flags being raised, I think we owe it to the voters of the state to pause and fully vet the ideas before we enact these these changes, these pretty significant changes to how we conduct our elections.

- I just wanna point out that in 2020, the three day period was extended to nine days, not through legislation but through the actions of the state board.

There were collusive settlement with the Democratic attorney Mark Elias and so what I think the legislature is saying is, "Okay, if we're gonna make changes, "it needs to come through us."

- It can't be through these rules and regulations, through Byzantine structures and state government that change these rules.

And so I think that is what more of what the legislature is doing right now versus trying to do things through an end run, through administrative process.

- And so, Dawn, I do have a question.

So we've talked a lot about the latter part of elections here with those regulations, but absentee voting starts two months before election day.

Is that a factor in any of the decisions around some of these election regulations?

- Well, this year, I mean, it's municipal elections this fall.

I was thinking you started saying the timeline.

I thought, wow, is it already like early voting still for like local elections?

Not yet.

- No.

- It does start early and there's, I think, across the country, like obviously every cycle and depending on the party and power, they wanna move election laws a little bit if it ends up advantaging their party.

I think we've seen that play out in the court system with how that's come in the past, and with voter intimidation and questions raised.

I think, obviously, historically in the United States there has been that during elections pretty severely in the past.

So I think people's perspectives, they're thinking about historically like, why something is good or bad, what you want for your own party, what branch of government you're on.

I don't think election laws ever going to be something that everyone is like, "This is great.

Let's have like exactly this timeline and we all agree."

And that's just not how politics and government works.

- UNC Chapel Hills Chancellor offered additional details this week around the free tuition program.

In-state students of families earning less than $80,000 a year qualify.

The tuition program could benefit 150 to 200 students.

PBS North Carolina is part of the UNC system.

Coming back to you, Dawn.

This program is similar to what Duke has talked about and their program would benefit around 300 students.

Do you think that a free tuition program like this or similar program would help access to higher education?

- I think it's interesting to see how many doors this opens for people, and Duke's income level is actually, is, of course, much higher because it's much much more expensive to go to Duke, and as a parent when you start looking at tuition and it's like, Lord.

So I think that a lot of working class, middle class parents that'll look at these lines and think, "Wow, there's actually an opportunity for my child" to go to a school that they thought was just not within reach for financial reasons or their loans would last so long that they would be in the red for a really long time, and you wouldn't get the return on investment of going to college.

Plus you really also need to sell higher ed to people, because some of that has changed over the years on how interested people are going to these schools.

So if more people end up being educated, if there's a way to fund this and a fair way to give that opportunity, I think a lot of people will take advantage and it would be hard to say, no, they don't want more people to be able to be educated 'cause obviously that benefits more than just the person.

- Senator Galey, do schools like Carolina and Duke have recruitment problems that they feel like this free tuition offering would help fill a gap?

- My observation is that they don't.

I guess Chancellor Guskiewicz said in his comments that they wanna be sure that people who come from more modest income homes don't feel that there is a barrier to going to Carolina, because of finances.

I think it is important to think of this as more of a grant, like a finish line grant rather than as a free tuition program.

I know that there was discussion in the education section of the budget when we were working on our part.

Of course, I don't know what's gonna be in the budget and how the final form is gonna be, but there was a lot of discussion about finish line grants in the community college system space.

There are a lot of people who sign up for higher education at different levels who find that they just can't complete the degree, because the car breaks down or somebody gets sick or there's another adverse financial thing that comes into play.

And so we're talking about finish line grants in the community college system.

I see this tuition program as being sort of a different, morphing of that concept where we're gonna tell students at the beginning, we're gonna cover that last piece of your tuition.

So this is after federal scholarships, Pell Grants, this is after state, this is after other kinds of financial aid.

This is the last piece.

- So thank you so much.

Thanks all of our panelists for joining us.

Email your thoughts and opinions to statelines@pbsnc.org.

I'm Anna Beavon Gravely.

Thanks for watching and we'll see you next time.

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