- [Announcer] Senate Republicans move to expand school vouchers saying North Carolina families have spoken loud and clear.

And campus protests, including those happening in the UNC system, spark a presidential response.

This is State Lines.

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[uplifting music] ♪ [uplifting music continues] - Welcome to State Lines.

I'm Kelly McCullen.

Joining me today political analyst and good friend for PBS North Carolina, Joe Stewart.

Hey, Joe.

- Kelly, how are you today?

- Couldn't be better, representative Matthew Winslow, gotta get all your counties right, Franklin and Grandville Counties.

- Good morning, good morning.

- Yeah, hello.

Mary Wills Bode as Senator.

- Yeah.

- [Kelly] From up around Matthew Winslow's Way, you're Granville and Wake Counties, I gotta keep all this straight.

Look who's debuting, would you please welcome the professor himself, David McClennan of Meredith College.

- Kelly.

- [Kelly] Are you ready for this?

- I think I have steeled myself sufficiently, so I'm ready.

It's great to be with all of you.

- And if we're worried about what they think of us, this man will know they love us or hate us.

Well, right now, the second week of the 2024 legislative session is underway.

It saw Senate Republicans pass an expansion of the opportunity scholarships or school vouchers.

The GOP says families are overwhelmingly in support of public vouchers to help them cover private school tuition costs.

The senators also heard in committee that about 55,000 families were on a wait list for these scholarships.

And that a $248 million boost would clear that backlog in time for fall classes.

In previous school years, there have been leftover voucher funds, but one Senator Mike Lee out of New Hanover County, actually thanks Governor Cooper for raising awareness.

- The governor went around the state telling everybody about opportunity scholarships.

I mean everybody, so that people came to me on the street that I'd never met before and said, I just heard the governor, is that true?

And I said, well, it depends on which part you're talking about.

The part about opportunity scholarships being available is very true.

And so you saw in the first week or the first day, that is more applications are received than the entire priority application period in 2023.

I mean, it was really amazing.

- And I think that we should spend that money on other priorities, not again, welfare for the wealthiest families at taxpayer expense.

But 197 million would cover North Carolina pre-K, would clear that wait list, 200 million would provide childcare subsidy grants so families can go to work and know their kids are safe.

128 and a half million would be subsidies for working families in low wealth and rural counties to help pay for childcare.

Or we could spend it on an additional 3.4% raise for public school teachers.

- Well, Joe, has the horse left the barn on school vouchers in North Carolina?

- Well, I think this is a priority of the Republican leadership on both the House and Senate side.

The opportunity for parents to make different choices in terms of the education of their children.

The big push to expand the number of charter schools in the state was part of this, to make it easier for people to choose homeschooling as an option.

And the opportunity scholarships sort of fits in this paradigm of what Republicans see as a valuable way for parents to determine what's in the best interest of their own children.

And what happened, as you saw in this clip, there was a tremendous amount of interest in this program.

55,000 kids that applied for this and qualified, but there wasn't funding sufficient from the budgetary action the legislature took last session.

The Republican leadership said in this session they wanted to do something about it.

They voted out the appropriation so that all of those kids that qualified will be eligible to get these funds for their private school tuition and fees in the fall of this year.

- Representative, you know a bill's on the move when the Senate goes one committee to the floor passed by a super majority which they enjoy that majority right now.

School vouchers or opportunity scholarships.

Opportunity scholarships sounds so light and flowery.

School vouchers sounds like something more menacing.

What are parents telling you?

Even democratic parents who are out there?

I mean, I can see the debate.

- Well, the reason it's an opportunity is because it's providing an opportunity for the students and the parents.

We've been teaching our kids the same way for the last 100 years.

And parents want to see something different.

We've got roughly little over a hundred thousand students and we got 55,000 applications.

So that tells you how popular the program actually is.

And unfortunately we still have schools in our state that receive Ds and Fs for generations.

And those parents said, we wanna see something different.

We wanna see some change.

And so this gives them that opportunity to do something different for their families and their children.

- Senator, you're on the democratic side and of course it was a unified opposition or sort of appeared to be to opportunity scholarships.

What's the position from that point?

Because Ralph Heis, Senator Lee brought up, families want it, they obviously do.

There's a wait list out, but Senator Marcus, the Democrat from Mecklenburg, says, look at all these other issues we have.

Everybody has an issue when it comes to kids getting them an education.

- Sure, certainly.

So there are a lot of needs across North Carolina.

We know that, and Senator Marcus listed some of the ones, some alternative ways we could help families in North Carolina.

But as a state senator, you know, when I am looking at taxpayer dollars, how we're gonna spend taxpayer dollars, I really like to think of it as an investment.

Where is that dollar going that is the highest and best use?

And what metrics do we have in place to make sure that those dollars are being spent the way they're supposed to be spent, they're intended to be spent.

And an issue yesterday that we talked about is that hundreds of millions of dollars are going to private schools, many of whom are religious schools, for which there is no quality control for the curriculum.

And there's no oversight for the testing mechanisms to ensure that all of these children, all of the children in these schools are receiving that sound, basic education.

And so, you know, one thing that I would like to do is remind my Republican colleagues of Ronald Reagan's famous quote, trust, but verify.

We can trust these schools, but we also need to verify that they're doing what they say they're doing.

Like we do to public schools and really ensure that the children of North Carolina are getting the education they need, and that taxpayers can feel good about their dollars going to those private institutions.

- So do you think parents aren't qualified to make the best decision for their households?

- No, it's really, you know, representative Winslow, I don't think it is that, I think it's taxpayers, we are beholden to the taxpayers to make sure that those dollars are going to the highest and best use.

I have no doubt that parents know where their children should be sent to school.

And they are, they have that oversight.

You know, in Granville County we have school choice for public school, you can send your child to any public school you wanna go to.

But, I think at the end of the day, the taxpayers, we still have an obligation to the taxpayers to say, we are holding these places accountable because it's also your money.

And I think that is a big difference.

You know, I cast no dispersions on parents and letting them choose where they want their child to go to school.

Certainly my parents did that and I intend to do that if I ever have children.

But, I also think that we do have an obligation to the taxpayers of North Carolina.

- All right.

Go ahead.

- I think we have an obligation too.

We pay the taxes in, we should choose where we wanna spend it.

I can choose which car I'm gonna drive, which house I'm gonna buy, where I'm gonna live.

I should be able to choose where I'm gonna send my child to school and not be told by Monopoly where my child's gonna have to be educated.

- What about the kid that's young, smart, poor, and they have a high upside potential?

Let's face it, the parent doesn't get involved or frankly doesn't care, you're sticking those into the public schools, you're sticking those on your school board and your county commissioners.

There's kids that come in here, need to learn English because they can't speak it.

What do you do with them?

We've talked about this before, but now, this is an expansion and it's a real issue.

What do you do with public schools?

What is the role if you give parents full freedom to choose?

- Privately, our public schools are saying, we realize now that we've had too long with no competition.

And the competition is driving them to change the way they think about how we should be educated.

All our kids, in my own to household, we got two different kids.

I got a boy and a girl raised same household, same values, and guess what?

They're two different individuals.

And the schools have been teaching for so long that everyone thinks and does the same way and they are branching out and they really are trying hard in the traditional public school system, say, we can do it better and we can do something different because the competition is forcing that in the background.

- And the one thing I'll say about competition is that the public schools in North Carolina are not playing on an even playing field with the private and charter schools.

Our public schools have to admit every child that comes in, our public schools have to provide free and reduced lunch, and our public schools have to provide transportation.

Let alone the additional testing requirements that these schools have.

And so, really if we're gonna talk about competition, let's talk about creating an equal playing field.

You know, our private and charter schools are also allowed to do year round calendar.

Our public schools are not allowed that opportunity.

And so, I think if we wanna talk about competition, we also need to talk about making sure there's an even playing field for both schools to compete.

- That we can agree on.

- Professor McClennan, well, we've heard from the left, well not from the left, from the Democrats and the Republic, I don't know what left and right means in the State anymore.

So what do the people think, Mr.

Political Scientist?

- Well, I've surveyed on this particular issue, and it's interesting that North Carolinians like the parental choice, but they also wanna improve the public schools.

And so I think this is where a public opinion really kind of supports both positions, they want higher teacher pay, they want the public schools to get more investment from tax dollars.

They like parental choice.

So the idea of the opportunity scholarship is generally supported by public opinion.

And so, I think as you look at what are the big issues going into the 2024 elections, education is still up there in the top issues.

And so I think what parents and non-parents were saying is, we recognize the importance of public education and education generally, we just want it all to be better.

- I don't have very many political scientists on and people who do polling, direct polling, but how valuable is the way you word that question?

'Cause you could ask me a question a certain way and we'd all agree with opportunity scholarships, you ask it another way and we wouldn't wanna harm public education.

How important is that?

- It's very important and that's why we ask it multiple ways.

I mean, we want to know whether the idea of just a, you know, do you support taxpayer money going toward vouchers for private schools?

Then we'll ask, do you support taxpayer money going toward opportunity scholarships for people to use in private schools?

And we'll ask, is it, do you support it going to all parents or just as the original opportunity scholarship was, for low income parents?

So we ask it multiple ways.

Interestingly, there are a lot of differences in terms of the results.

When you ask it about opportunity scholarships to go to the how you framed at the very beginning, it polls higher than vouchers.

- It does seem weaponized if you wanna fight it.

And opportunity scholarships seem very liberating if you use it in that terminology.

Words matter, Joe.

- Words do seem to matter.

And you know, in the context of an election year, all of the things that the legislature do somehow end up being part of the discourse as these legislators go back and run for election or reelection in their districts.

And to Dr. McClennan's point, the way voters perceive these issues is sort of bifurcated between what I would want as a parent of a child and what I would want as a taxpayer.

And sometimes that Venn diagram overlaps a little bit, but it is also important to remember that the system of public education in the State of North Carolina is also intended to provide for the necessary instruction for a generation of North Carolinians to be ready to inherit the jobs of the 21st century economy.

And so it's not just an abstract of what do we do that's in the best interest of parents and kids, as a State to remain economically vibrant, we need to make sure we're doing everything we can so that the workforce is prepared for what the economy's gonna bring.

- Senator Bode did Governor Cooper lend a lot of credence to this?

So parents heard about it through his stump speeches, fighting opportunity scholar or vouchers.

And they come and they look into it and he inadvertently boosts the wait list.

- You know, I think that Governor Cooper has been going around the state talking both about public schools and the need to support our public schools and also about opportunity scholarships.

The reality of the situation is that opportunity scholarships are part of the educational system in North Carolina.

You know, I think what is incumbent upon us is to really understand and hold those dollars accountable.

And so that's what we tried to do yesterday on the Senate floor, is that those taxpayer dollars, just because they're going to education doesn't mean that they have to stop being held accountable.

And I think that's really important for the people of North Carolina to understand because we have, I've seen the polling about people love their local public school, they love their child's teacher, and they also really don't love the idea of their public taxpayer dollars going to religious institutions.

That challenges the very notion of one of the tenets of what our country was founded on, the separation of church and State.

And so, there is a lot of nuance here.

I think it is different when you talk to an individual parent versus a taxpayer, and that's just you know, it's incumbent upon us to do the job of making sure that those dollars are held accountable and are going to the places they need to be going.

- Bill moved very, very quickly.

Well, other big, headline-grabbing issues in this state.

One comes out of UNC Chapel Hill this week where campus police shut down what's called the Gaza Solidarity encampment.

Its that tent camp but with the protestors.

Happened on campus this week.

The last day of classes in Chapel Hill were canceled Tuesday.

Here's the final tally of people that were somehow ticketed, detained.

36 detained, 27 were given trespassing tickets.

Six of that crowd somehow got arrested and sent to jail.

Anti-Israeli or Free-Palestine protests, your choice of descriptor, they're popping up all over college campuses, especially in the Northeast to a point President Joe Biden addressed it on Thursday.

- Violent protest is not protected.

Peaceful protest is.

It's against the law when violence occurs.

Destroying property is not a peaceful protest.

It's against the law.

Vandalism, trespassing, breaking windows, shutting down campuses, forcing the cancellation of classes and graduations.

None of this is a peaceful protest.

Threatening people, intimidating people, instilling fear in people is not peaceful protest.

It's against the law.

Dissent is essential to democracy, but dissent must never lead to disorder or to denying the rights of others so students can finish the semester and their college education.

- Representative Winslow, it'd be so easy to take this toward Trump and Biden in the national debate.

This is "State Lines."

The president comes out, and I remember when he was walking off, I didn't put it in the clip, a reporter goes, "Do these protests make you and your team look at policies differently?"

He goes, "No," and he walked right out the door.

What's with these protests?

They don't seem to be catching on with the political class.

- I think it's unfortunate that you have the president of the United States standing up and saying, "We do not support these protests the way they are," and all along they're pressing, you know, defund the police, and no longer following the rule of law.

We have an Attorney General who doesn't wanna enforce the law, and that's what happens when you have a society that says they no longer respect our police force.

Chapel Hill pushed out four of their commissioners.

Said, "Hey, we don't support the police in taking their actions on the campus."

They didn't say we didn't support the violence.

They said, "We don't support the police, the actions they took on the campus," and they wouldn't send their police force to help in that situation.

So we have continued to have Democrats pushing this agenda of, we don't support the law here in North Carolina.

This is what's gonna continue to happen.

- Senator Bode, but Democrats did step forward and that was as clean cut as any speech I would hear a president say.

He doesn't believe trespassing is peaceful and not lawful protest.

Was the Chapel Hill protest...

I guess it was protesting in a way, if they ask you to leave.

I don't know all the nuances of protesting laws and ethics.

Haven't done much of it.

What do you make of this issue?

It seems to be, not engulfing, but at least getting Republican and Democrat attention.

- Sure.

So I think what the President said in his speech... we have these two values in our American society.

We have the right to peacefully protest and be heard and dissent, but we also have the value of the rule of law.

And you know, I wanted to say I voted for the anti-riot bill last year.

I believe there is a difference between peaceful protest and a riot.

And so I just wanna reiterate that point.

I think it is important.

And I think President Biden said this, that this isn't a moment to score political points.

This is a point of clarity for people that Americans, we can agree that there is a line and we need to respect that line.

And I will say that, you know, Lee Roberts, I think did a great job, the interim chancellor, of being very firm in saying, these are our values, we respect freedom of speech, but we're also gonna ensure that our students are safe.

- Did Interim Chancellor Roberts help himself with possibly getting the permanent job by the way he led or behaved with this protest this week, because there's a lot of opposition to him even serving as an interim.

- I think he was very resolute.

I think he was very clear about the fact that safety is their number-one priority, but as a public institution, they also have to ensure that people have a right to be heard.

And, you know, I think he was very clear with that when he made his speech and I think that message was received.

- Professor McLennan, political science.

A lot of, I mean, we're young and we're emotional.

Your students had to be engaged in politics on this one.

How do you keep it focused on the actual nuts and bolts of discourse versus students just getting so emotional that they lose control over certain ways that they're seeing the debate and you're there to guide them on at least how to properly consider their options?

- Well, I asked them to look at different information sources.

Much of what this is being driven by is TikTok.

I mean, our students are getting the Palestinian perspective primarily.

And so when they talk about Joe Biden, they think he's out of touch with what's going on in the world.

And so the speech was interesting yesterday.

They're not gonna pay any attention to it.

That's the problem.

So I encourage them to get a historical understanding of what's been going on in that part of the world.

To know the history, to know the reasons why the Biden administration continues to support Israel and also tries to tamp down the violence in Gaza.

It's a very difficult task because the emotions are playing a huge role on college campuses, mine and others.

- Joe.

TikTok again.

Curse the internet!

Let's go back to three-by-five index cards.

Let's do it.

- Or stone, right?

Stone tablets.

- I think the thing that I'm interested in, in this regard, is what this cohort of voters is gonna think about the election in November.

I think the protest that we're seeing on college campuses is as much as anything, about a simmering anger among that cohort of voters.

Younger people in the polling have expressed some frustration that it appears the two presidential candidates are both old, who they are, and young people, I think- - [Kelly] Angry about what?

At first-class universities, living a great life.

- Well, I think they're expressing political anger.

that they wish that there was- - It's fine.

I'm just asking where's the hardship if you go to school at Chapel Hill?

- Well, no, but I think they wish that the choices for president were more reflective generationally.

You know, the 2008 election, young people were very enthusiastic about Barack Obama.

Yes, it was making history as the first African American president, but Barack Obama was young.

He was relatable to a younger cohort of voters.

And I think to some extent, as Dr. McLennan said, it'll be very interesting to see, subsequent to these outbursts on campuses, do we see in polling that young people are fleeing from supporting Joe Biden for president?

Does this antagonize their sense of animosity towards two presidential candidates they don't feel are relatable?

I think to be fair.

I mean, the best survey of young people is the Harvard University survey that just came out.

And really, the Gaza situation ranked well down the list.

They're concerned about the same things as you and I are concerned with.

Inflation, economy, crime, those kind of things.

It's a segment of the college population that is protesting, whether it be on the Chapel Hill campus or elsewhere.

They get a lot of headlines, they get a lot of news coverage.

But, you know, as we were talking about in the green room, the students that I have, they're worried about can they live on their own away from their parents after they get a job.

So, you know, they have this, they're not as a group.

But, to go to your other point, you know, they aren't polling as well as they did in 2020 in terms of the Biden campaign.

So that's something that he's very concerned with.

- So very legitimate that what Joe is saying, young voters may turn on the sitting president.

But in favor of who?

- Well, that's where-- - Trump?

- You know, they're not big Trump supporters.

I mean, there's a segment of them that are.

I think this is where Robert F. Kennedy Jr. could, you know, we're talking about 9% support in North Carolina, in my recent poll.

Stronger among young people than it was-- - You don't see him going down to 1%, like all the other third party things.

- You know, I mean, that would be what, as a political scientist, I would say, most third party candidates, they dwindle in support.

But, you know, he could catch fire because of their dissatisfaction with the two parties.

- And the ironic thing is, Robert Kennedy Jr. is not that much younger than the two other guys.

[laughs] - No, he's 70 years.

- But he's newer to the scene.

And I think when I'm on college campuses, whether it be at your campus, or at UNC, or at Duke, I think these young folks are, you know, this isn't a new thing for young folks.

They're looking for inspiration.

Wherever they can find it.

And so, you know, we have to remember that for the vast majority of their life, they have, Joe Biden and Donald Trump have been a part of their political arc, really predominated their political arc.

And they're coming to an ability to vote.

And so, you know, it is not surprising that they would be thinking about and looking for other alternatives when their political discourse for the vast majority of their life has been dominated by these two candidates.

- Kelly, what we wanna talk about is those young men standing for glory as if tar was on their heels.

- All right, there you go.

Well, I'm a product of the UNC system, so I love the UNC system.

I don't care.

And I work for them too.

PBS NC is part of that.

So we're tied with Chapel Hill, in case you folks didn't know.

In some ways.

Also, Raleigh and Greenville, and App, and Calloway.

The upcoming Republican runoff for the 13th US House seat may have reached an early conclusion this week.

Candidate Kelly Daughtry, there you see her, suspended her campaign Thursday.

Saying the Trump endorsement of her opponent, attorney Brad Knott, made winning the primary impossible.

Her name will still be on the runoff ballot.

This 13th district is in the triangle area.

And is such a Republican lien that incumbent Democratic representative, Wiley Nickel, just simply refused to seek reelection.

So Democrat Frank Pierce will face the GOP nominee, the presumptive nominee, not at this point, Professor McClellan.

It's a runoff, all right.

Kelly Daughtry got run off.

- She got run off.

And you know, that is, there's no precedent for that.

I mean, the votes are already being cast, early votes are being cast.

To have someone drop out this late in the cycle is, you know, highly unusual, but also probably smart for her.

I mean, the Trump endorsement, looking at academic research, is worth a significant amount, almost double digits.

So, you know, the fact that they, she may have won the, or got the most votes in the first primary.

Once that endorsement came through, she's probably made a very good strategic decision.

This may protect her future.

- All right, Joe, I'm down to 90 seconds.

Go for it.

Kelly Daughtry, millions gone now.

- Well, I think this is the last interesting thing in the congressional race is this cycle.

All we have left now is the 1st congressional district, which is the only competitive congressional district where you have Don Davis, the incumbent, Laurie Buckhout, a retired army officer.

That's where the emphasis now will shift.

And the thing to note in the second runoff for the primary, the early voting, the vast majority of votes cast were cast in the 13th district because people were interested in that.

There are two statewide races also on the runoff ballot, but there wasn't any interest in those in anywhere else other than where there was a competitive runoff in the congressional race.

- And representative, don't forget, go vote in the 13th GOP primary, you have a runoff for lieutenant governor.

I don't wanna diminish the vote by saying-- [all chattering] Final words, I got about 15, 20 seconds for each of you.

- It's amazing how much money was spent on this primary.

I think we're in the tens of millions of dollars.

And here at the very end, it's like, almost like the balloon was just popped.

You know, it's like, oh, you know?

And so, it's amazing between the top three candidates how much was spent on a primary race.

And it's gonna be more than was spent in some of the general elections in the state.

- Is it better to pull out before you can, before you think you lose, or lose an election?

- Oh, I don't know.

I don't have the-- - I think it probably came down to money.

The most expensive TV that you buy is the TV right before the election date.

So, I would imagine that was the calculus.

If they could spend enough money to make a difference or not.

And you know, they used the information that they had available to make that decision.

- Good point on that.

Joe, Matt, Mary, David, thank you so much for being on the show.

- Absolutely.

- Come back anytime, will ya?

Give us your thoughts.

Thank you for watching us.

Email us your thoughts as well.

You don't have to be a political scientist, or a pollster, or politician, or Joe Stewart.

StateLines@pbsnc.org is the email.

I'll read every one.

I'm Kelly McCullen.

Thank you for watching.

I'll see you next time.

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