- [Kelly McCullen] House leaders gauge Republican interest in adding casino legalization to the state budget bill.

And bar owners say state COVID-19 lockdowns hurt their businesses and the state should pay up.

This is State Lines.

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[bright uplifting music] ♪ - Hi there, welcome to State Lines, I'm Kelly McCullen.

Joining me on this week's panel political strategist, Morgan Jackson, Representative Sarah Crawford of Wake County.

Welcome to the show, Representative Allen Chesser from Nash County, and our friend Dawn Vaughan, of the News and Observer, taking up chair number four.

Welcome everyone.

Lot of vice to talk about, we got some gambling.

Got some recreational marijuana.

Got a little alcohol.

It's a party, Morgan.

- It's a good time all the time.

- Well, let's start with casinos.

House Republicans they say are holding private discussions, happened this week on the possible legalization of casinos on non-tribal lands.

House Speaker, Tim Moore, says he needs to see a majority of the state House's 72 Republicans that caucus, they need to show support for casinos before agreeing to place it in a final budget deal.

It appears the state Senate would approve casinos.

Some local activists are calling for local referendum, the House speaker said this week.

Elected local leaders should hold the power over the casinos and their placement and then they can answer to local voters, Dawn.

There you go, localism at its best.

Let the voters decide or let the county commissioners decide?

- I thought it was really interesting that Rockingham County folks came to the legislature this past week, 'cause you usually don't see that.

At least not for Berger's district.

So that was, that was interesting.

Republicans had a over like three to four hour-long caucus talking about it, doesn't seem like the votes were there and there's a lot of talk throughout the week.

But I honestly did not have casinos on my bingo card for what would be the final final part of the budget this year.

But it looks like that's how it panned out.

- Representative Chesser, you're in the caucus.

You can't spill too much tea there, but you know- - Never heard of it.

- 30, what is it, 36 or 37 of you must say we will at least support a casino.

- The general rule is 37.

- Okay.

- For moving an issue across the line.

But we'll see.

We, the discussions are ongoing.

Obviously I can't divulge what what happens behind those closed doors.

- [Kelly] Well, you can if you would like.

- But not if I wanna stay in the caucus.

- Oh.

- [laughs] So... Obviously, varying opinions in the room, which is great.

You... as soon as you get into an echo chamber you're in a really bad spot.

So I like the debate.

I like the back and forth that we have and it's a passion on both sides and and we're still talking about it.

It's still ongoing.

- Has any deference been given to those representatives from the potentially affected counties where if they say they want it why should someone out in the eastern, northeastern part of the state say "No, we don't."

- Yeah, that's been part of the conversation.

It's actually one of my pieces of pushback.

Nash County's made the news a little bit lately over this particular issue.

And one of my county commissioners was calling for a statewide referendum and I was like, "Hey, hey, hey, wait, wait, wait."

I don't want every other county telling Nash County what to do.

Like if, this would be a decision that we make.

And so, there's pros and cons both ways but there has been some deference given, we've been allowed to speak on the issue.

But like I said, it was nearly a four hour caucus and maybe five people didn't speak on the issue.

So it's been one of those that more caucus involvement than I've seen on other issues.

- Have you gone public?

- Have I gone public?

- Where you stand for representing Nash County?

- What's that?

- Do you have, for Nash County what do you think?

Or have you gone public with what you think about it?

- Yeah, so my attempt has been to provide the facts for people because this kind of came out in the 11th hour and so people just don't know what it says.

And my first vision of the draft legislation came from WRL just like everybody else, which is strange.

So I had to become a quick study of it and there's so much misinformation out there.

So my goal has been not to put my thumb on the scale, provide the people of Nash County with as accurate information as I can.

And the reason I haven't said anything is so that I'm not influencing the feedback that I'm getting from my constituents.

I want to know where they stand.

- Representative Crawford, if this went to a full floor vote, Democrats could join and I would think casinos might would go through.

I can't speak solely for that but what is it like being a Democrat and the House has taken this issue, gone to a caucus and said "you gotta have a majority of the House Republican caucus, not a majority of the House?"

- Yeah, absolutely.

Well I have heard through the grapevine this week that Speaker Moore has been calling Democrats.

He has not called me, so I can't speak to that firsthand.

But, trying to find out where folks are on this issue.

And I think, much like the Republican caucus you're gonna have folks across all sides of this issue and the Democratic caucus as well.

And I think, bottom line is we are all for new industry coming into the state supporting the economic development in North Carolina, supporting our citizens.

But I wanna see what's in the final bill.

I wanna see are these gonna be good paying jobs for North Carolinians?

Are there gonna be good workplace protections?

Are we gonna make sure that we've got protections for people who have addictions gambling?

What we can't do, what we should not do is build North Carolina's economy on the backs of addicts.

And I kind of joked this week that Republicans caucused for three and a half, four hours closer to four hours, it sounds like, on this issue.

Why aren't we having four hour discussions on how we get quality public education to every student in North Carolina?

I mean, those are the kinds of things that we should be talking about when we talk about economic development.

Those are two are unequivocally linked.

- But casinos are so much fun.

They're new, they're a big surprise, Morgan.

First of all, sir, thank you for your transparency.

You work in the in political advocacy, you have said that I have a casino interest that I represent, thank you.

I won't ask you what you think, you support this.

But to their point, big money comes in from out of state, invests in a poor or underserved community or a county.

What do you say to the critics who would say "you're just tapping a line financially back to Las Vegas, poor folks money goes back to Vegas."

Yeah, you get a few jobs against the fact that an entertainment center in any of these counties would be a boom.

- Listen, I think that's the decision and that's the decision that the state House and the state Senate have to make and ultimately, is how you take those competing interests against each other.

A lot of the discussions that have taken place around this potential casino developments in North Carolina are really in underserved counties that have been struggling for jobs.

I think You have to balance that with the need of the community economically, as well as their financial stability.

I think, when you look at a lot of these developments around the country, the thing I think that gets lost is it's not just casinos.

It is Concord Mills that happens to have a casino.

It is those kind of developments and I think those are longer.

I think, a lot of folks you've see in a lot of states, those are really long-term sustaining jobs that are movie theaters, they're concert halls, they're restaurants, they're bars, they're shops, there's doctor's offices, all these kind of things and so, the discussion is around casinos, but it really, I think the, one of the reasons it's actually being considered this year is because it's a broader look at that of how you can create potentially 2,500 jobs in multiple locations in rural, depressed areas and I think that's a discussion that needs to take place.

- All right, next topic will be about the Court of Appeals in North Carolina.

It says it will allow bar owners lawsuit against the Cooper administration and state legislative leaders to continue.

This group of owners want financial damages due to Covid-19 era shutdowns, lockdowns and restrictions on operations.

These owners say Governor Roy Cooper's executive orders prevented them from earning a living.

Defendants believe state government should be immune from such lawsuits under the concept of sovereign immunity.

State Supreme Court could decide if the bar owner's constitutional right to earn a living trumps, no pun intended, sovereign immunity.

Morgan, this is an interesting one, four, three and a half years after the fact, now owners say these rules, Governor Cooper's rules, hurt us, now we want pay back.

- Well, I think there's several things to think about here.

I think the biggest issue that is the most important of this is what is the government, and in this case the governor's ability to govern and act during an emergency and to make decisions that save lives and to prevent damage to our state, whether it's a hurricane, whether it is a pandemic and I think it's important to remind folks, it's so easy to sit here three years later and say, "Okay, well we should have done this, "we should have done that."

At the time everybody was trying to follow the data, the science and the facts at the time of a pandemic that no one had ever dealt with and the data and the science and the facts at the time were saying that whether it's large concert halls, whether it is large indoor meetings, whether bars, whether restaurants, things of that nature, a highly contagious virus could spread very rapidly in there and so all of the medical professionals or most of them at the time were saying, "These are the kind of places "that when we don't have a vaccine, "when we don't know the damage "that can be caused by this virus."

And we're seeing places like New York and we saw Italy and France and New York and people piling up in hospital rooms.

You had to make these decisions and this was wasn't a Democrat or Republican decision.

You had Republican governors in a neighboring states all around the country making the same decision and I would say to pull this back and I think it's important for the courts, but this is not a co this should not be a COVID discussion.

This is, does the government have an ability to govern during an emergency and set rules to keep people safe?

And that's what it's really about it at its heart.

- From your perspective, this isn't a lawsuit against Governor Cooper as much as it's a group of business owners, private enterprise, going after the man or the government.

- Well it is, and again, I think part of this is, is generated out of the sort of COVID hysteria and the partisanship that has taken place, especially post COVID, not that we're post COVID, but it is obviously still around, but post vaccine, post mortality rates really dropping after the vaccine.

But, this is what is the government's responsibility and should, like in most every other case, the government be immune when they're taking actions to keep the public safe from lawsuit and that's been the traditional in North Carolina and the federal government for hundreds of years.

- As a person, it is an interesting topic, Sarah Crawford, Wake County, they're still trying to figure out a way to restore the vibrancy of downtown Raleigh because they say it never came back from COVID-19.

- Well, it hasn't been that long since the COVID-19 pandemic and I think it's still recovering.

It's gonna be recovering for a long time.

The pandemic was hard for everybody and I agree that the government has a responsibility to make decisions.

This was a historic event that I pray we never have to go through again.

But, we had to make decisions, government had to make decisions, Governor Cooper had to make decisions in the best interest of the people.

As chief executive officer of the state, his primary responsibility is to protect the safety of the state citizens and I think he did exactly that.

There are tons of studies that correlate the openness of a state with the COVID-19 death rates and I commend Governor Cooper for the job that he did in protecting our citizens.

- Representative Chester, this will be a high profile suit if you pay attention to state politics and COVID is back and there's people rumbling, they're scared masks are gonna come back and shutdowns are gonna come back this fall.

- Yeah, so when we're talking about this, I agree, this is all about what government's role is and what government authorities are and I think our state constitution very clearly states that people have a right to the fruits of their labor which means by default they have a right to work and so I think that's what's truly an issue here isn't whether or not the governor acted in good faith, it's whether he had the authority to shut down labor forces and then it's the consistency with which he did it.

You had Walmarts and Home Depots and Lowe's staying open, but mom and Pops were being closed and that's essentially who's filing the suit here, mom and pops, bars, smaller facilities that didn't have the ability to fight the state government like a Home Depot, like a Lowe's, like a Walmart would.

And so were we picking winners and losers there while we were violating rights?

Safety, I don't think should ever really give us an option to be able to violate rights.

I'm a libertarian leaning Republican which puts me in at odds with my own caucus sometimes.

But I always believe that we should always be balancing the authority of government with the liberty of the people that we're inflicting our will upon.

- That was a nice comment right there, Doss.

I heard a soundbite right there.

However, we think North Carolinians will engage on this or is COVID so far in our rear view mirror, we're back to normal, this lawsuit we'll go through, but without the attention it might have gotten in 2021 or two?

- I've noticed you were talking about attention that some republicans have been putting messages out because I think of COVID, the fall winter surge, Lieutenant Governor Robinson is running for governor in the Republican primary, is talking about being anti mask and all of this and I thought, "Is it the last election again?

"Is this gonna be an issue?

"Maybe people want it to be an issue "if they think that'll get them votes."

But the law has changed and I remember during COVID, bill after bill, the Republicans passed about the restrictions on businesses and everything else and Cooper vetoed them all and there weren't the votes to.

To override, but the law has changed now, and the length of executive orders for states of emergency is different.

And there's Republican view that there's more of a backstop there, but it still gives the governor plenty of power.

It's just more of a middle ground, I think, than it was a few years ago.

- Let's hope we check in on another pandemic, what, 100 years between them.

So, I can go another 100 without one.

House is moving legislation to reform North Carolina's alcohol sales and distribution laws.

The bill would give local governments, and therefore local voters, the power to relax alcohol sales restrictions.

So, happy hours could return in towns where it's voted into existence.

Those were banned back in the 1980s.

ABC stores could open on Sundays and every holiday, except Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Businesses would get more options on where it could buy alcohol, expanding options beyond ABC warehouses.

Sarah, this is a complex bill.

Thanksgiving and Christmas is when people regret the store being closed the most.

But, I'll let you analyze the topic.

- Yeah, I mean, people are just gonna have to keep planning accordingly, right?

I mean, we've done that as a state for a long time.

We've planned accordingly for alcohol sales not on Sundays.

This bill has a lot in it.

It cleared the ABC Committee earlier this week.

It still has to go through a couple more hurdles before it comes to the floor for a vote, but I don't really anticipate there being much of a challenge getting across the finish line, should it come to both chambers for a vote.

But, there's a lot in this bill.

So, you mentioned happy hours.

There's been a prohibition on happy hours, I think since the eighties.

So that potentially comes back if a local government wants it to.

Sales on Sundays, all holidays, except for Christmas and Thanksgiving, as you mentioned.

And there are a lot of other provisions in this bill.

One of the things that I think is most interesting is a provision that impacts the sale of a bottle of liquor that's been aged in space.

And so, if you haven't been following this, I think this is fascinating, so if you haven't been following this, there's a distillery in Durham, Mystic Distillery, that has a bottle of bourbon that they send to outer space for a year, and you can purchase it for the low, low price of $75,000.

It's a little bit outta my price range.

Lemme correct that, a lot outta my price range.

But right now, the provision in the law is that there's like a 37% tax between a couple of different taxes, which makes that bottle of liquor over a hundred thousand dollars.

There's a new cap on sales of spirits that would only be a thousand dollars, making it much more likely that you too could afford a bottle of bourbon aged in space.

- I think that ran, didn't Moffitt run that bill?

[all chuckle] And it had, like, the bill title was Space Spirits, or something like that.

- Yeah.

- Wow.

- So, you know, it's an omnibus bill.

It has everything in it that, you know, the aside on the space bourbon is kind of fun, I think.

But this is just an effort to modernize our alcohol laws that are very outdated.

There's been an effort to do that over the past few years, and I think it's a step in the right direction for North Carolina.

- And kudos to whoever the lobbyist is that got that one put in there, Morgan, that's a nice word.

Representative Chesser, you're in the debate for this relaxation now in 2023.

What's different among conservatives from say the 1980s when happy hours were bad, and now we're looking at market forces saying, "Might be a good idea at this point."?

- Well, I think some of the fears kinda evaporated with it.

I mean, it's different generations now, we've been exposed to different things.

You know, some of us have left the state and come back and realize, "Hey, you know, we have happy hours in other states.

We don't have more DWIs, we don't have more traffic fatalities.

We don't have some of the things that we were told would happen if we loosen some of these regulations."

And so, that's the big driving factor is it's just a generational change, I think.

And people are starting to realize, you know, some people will abuse freedom, but it doesn't make us less safe.

It doesn't affect the economy the way they think it will.

I think this will actually be a boon for the restaurant and the service industry.

There's a lot of hurdles that are arbitrarily placed in front of restaurants right now and the service industry in general, which, I mean, we all partake in, and it's there for a reason.

So, I'm all for removing unneeded and unnecessary regulations.

- Can I ask you a philosophical question?

Voters that put you in office, social conservative versus market-driven republicanism or conservatism, where's that battle right now among the GOP vote?

Are you hearing more from people who say, "Give me freedom.

", which means you give up some of the social protections, or they want protection against so-called vice?

- So, I think that is the battle within the base right now.

Whether it's casinos, whether it's this, whether it's medical cannabis, it's the same argument.

So you have an evangelical, not throwing, you know, just terms around, but you have an evangelical far-right base that would rather not see those things come, would rather prevent vice from entering the market.

They see it as state sanctioned or anything, as opposed to the state just getting outta the way.

And then you have, you know, the libertarian-leaning people who are just like, "Hey, get the monkey of government off my back, and let me be free.

And, as long as I'm not hurting anyone else and no one's hurting me and no one's taking my property, then we'll be just fine."

And I think that is the divide within the base right now.

- I always wondered that when I hear some of these social issues come through.

What's the debate?

Dawn up, alcohol sales, it's a boring bill.

I've covered the legislature for a long time.

However, it does affect a lot of people, and a lot of people will be happy, and some will be really sad to see a proliferation of the booze.

- I was going through notes yesterday, I don't remember what lawmaker said it, but thought it was worth writing down that the more boring government is the more functional it is.

So, there's something to be said for that.

But I think what I've seen among Republicans is this balance of looking at the market and wanting to change things with alcohol, with casinos, but then not going so far that you lose some of those key votes, right, which is part of the budget debate right now.

And sports betting took so long to get everyone on board for.

And then casinos, the talk almost began immediately after sports betting was passed.

And then there's the, "That's too far."

And that's kind of what's come up this year.

- Alright, Dawn, I'll come back to you.

Very quickly on this topic, the Eastern Band of the Cherokee Indians have officially legalized recreational marijuana inside of North Carolina.

Tribal members approved marijuana usage on its lands in a Thursday referendum.

It's up to the tribal council to implement this order.

Voters have approved, or given authorization, to legalize for adults 21 and older.

But that said, the tribal council, Dawn, must actually authorize legalization.

The leaders say they'll take the vote and they'll follow the public's will on this, at least in Western North Carolina.

Came outta nowhere a little bit, and, at least as a statewide issue, but legalized marijuana is in our state now.

Is that the camel's nose under the tent?

And a nod to Bill Raven even, potentially.

- It is on that, within the boundary, right?

- Yes.

- Within, you know, on tribal land, and that you can, you'll be able to get it from a dispensary and and consume it there.

And I think what you were saying about people leaving North Carolina and coming back, you forget what other states are doing.

And North Carolina is kind of behind other states on things like this.

And again, with Republicans, who you would think would be more conservative on some of these issues, it was Senator Raven that was, you know, the driving force to try to get medical marijuana passed, but the the house stopped that.

So.

- Morgan are the tribes, are our Native American tribes ahead of the game on some of these issues?

- I think so.

And I think Don's right?

I mean, that- - That was a biased question.

Are they?

I mean, but, [laughs] but are they ahead of where public sentiment is, to rephrase that?

- Well, no.

Actually not.

They're not ahead of where public sentiment is.

They're ahead of where political sentiment is.

When you look at any poll across the state that took place this past year over medical cannabis, is incredibly high support.

Now, I'm not talking about 70, 80%, but in the 60's at a lot of times, which is high for a policy issue.

You see a lot of support for medical cannabis.

And I think we're gonna get there.

It's just the politics is a little bit behind public sentiment.

It's sort of like you go back 20 years, it's the lottery.

The public really wanted the lottery, and it took several sessions in order for the politics to catch up to that.

But I think we're gonna get there.

You know, I think the tribe is, is, has gotten ahead of everybody, but they also have the ability to do so, as a sovereign nation in their own, in the quail of boundary, they have the ability to do so.

But when you look at states around North Carolina that are moving in the direction of medical cannabis, or some actually have moved even much further than that, it's not even medical.

It's just, it's just, it is, what am I trying to say?

Marijuana in general is legalized and decriminalized.

And so I think that's the path path everybody's heading in this country.

It may take several years, but I think that's the path where we're headed.

- I wanna move to the next topic because tribal politics are tribal politics.

I'll leave the legislators out of this, and let them debate their own legislation.

But the house could take action on elections board legislation soon.

The State Board of elections, local elections boards could soon carry equal seating for Democrats and Republicans.

The legislature would hold elections board appointment powers, which would strip power from the governor's office, including future governors.

Opponents predict that strictly bipartisan elections boards will result in tie votes, and the rules on breaking ties, not very well defined, Alan Jesser.

Now this is in your wheelhouse.

Explain this bill, and your take on it.

- Yeah.

Explaining the bill would take the rest of the show.

- Well then, what do you think of the bill?

- Senate Bill 747, I mean, it's appropriately named.

It's huge, right?

The summary of the bill alone is 13 pages long.

It's just a massive bill.

So to break it down line by line, I think most of what's in there is common sense measures as far as getting people to trust the elections process again.

That's where I've been for a long time, is, if people don't trust the results of the elections, then we're never gonna have a settled political theater.

It's always gonna be, we're gonna be at war with each other.

We're gonna be at odds.

We're seeing it right now, again, in the Republican party right now, we've got a presidential primary with a candidate out there screaming that his election was stolen from him.

If people trusted the process completely, and it was open, transparent, stuff like that, we could put those rumors to bed pretty easily.

- Representative Crawford, I've got a minute and a half by the way, and we have to get outta this show, so.

- I don't really have anything good to say about this bill.

I think it's a bad, it's bad legislation.

It's bad for North Carolina.

It's another attempt by Republicans to grab power, to upend our democracy.

We need to leave elections alone, and stop spreading misinformation about our elections.

- Morgan, how does this affect the governor's office, if not Governor Cooper?

- Listen, this affects the people of North Carolina.

This is about, this is not about election integrity.

This is about power and control.

This is about the general assembly trying to take control of the elections process so they can silence the voice of the people who disagree with them.

They have already passed the law this year that would reduce the ability for students, African Americans, a number of folks to vote same day registration and early vote.

I mean, excuse me, absentee.

What this does, is really important to understand for voters, by creating an even Stephen board.

And there's a deadlock.

Guess what that means?

If you're, if Wake County, a county of a million people deadlocks on where the early vote location means, it means no early vote in Wake County, except at the downtown Board of Elections.

That's 2.9 million people who voted early in North Carolina.

That's at Jeopardy.

And again, this is about the legislature controlling.

They say it's an even Stephen board, but when it breaks deadlock, they choose the winner.

Like that's BS guys.

That's not even Stephen.

- Will the bill pass?

And if it does, and then we'll bring it back up.

Dawn, thank you.

We're out of time.

I would get your take, but the clock bell rings.

Thanks to our panelists for joining us this week.

Email your thoughts and opinions about what we've said, to state lines@pbsnc.org.

We will read every email, the good, the bad, even the ugly.

I'm Kelly McCullen.

Thank you so much for watching us this week, and we hope to see you next time on "Sate Lines."

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