Governor, vetoes overturned and in lame duck position, goes litigation route

(The Center Square) – His vetoes overturned, the governor known for “sue until it’s blue” tactics on voting district maps throughout his tenure is again going to court.

This time, the litigation targets evenly split bipartisan election boards and the process for appointing those who serve on them.

Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper, whose party currently holds majorities on both state and county election boards, says in a complaint filed in Wake County Superior Court on Tuesday that changes in Senate Bill 749 would gridlock state elections and violate the separation of powers. Cooper, term-limited, has less than 15 months remaining in office.

With the law, the lawsuit argued, the General Assembly “takes direct aim at established precedents and once again seeks to significantly interfere with the Governor’s constitutionally assigned executive branch duty of election law enforcement and to take much of that power for itself.”

The legal challenge comes just days after the General Assembly voted along party lines to overturn Cooper’s veto, and just over two months before changes in SB749 take root.

Effective Jan. 1, the legislation expands the current five members of the state Board of Elections to eight. The appointments would be made by leaders of both major political parties – two each by Republican leaders in the Senate and House of Representatives, and two each by Democratic leaders in the Senate and House, regardless of which party has majority in the respective chambers.

The governor, regardless of party, has been making the five appointments.

It’s a similar situation for election boards in the state’s 100 counties. Each would be reduced from five members to four. Rather than two each, the respective party leaders in each chamber would be responsible for one each.

County party leaders send forth names for their boards, and gubernatorial approvals usually come back with the governor naming a member of his party as the chairman. In recent history, squabbles on local or state levels usually go the way of the governor’s party.

Bill sponsors believe the changes are critical to restoring faith in the state’s elections, which multiple polling outlets show is low.

“We have a duty to ensure the integrity of our elections and a duty to ensure voters have confidence in our elections, regardless of who wins,” bill sponsor Sen. Paul Newton, R-Cabarrus, said in introducing the legislation.

The shift would also have a cascading effect on leadership at the Board of Elections, with new members selecting a new executive director by the end of January. Current state board members appointed by Cooper unanimously reappointed Karen Brinson Bell to a third two-year term as executive director in May.

Both the current board members – sworn in to four-year terms in May – and Bell could be looking for other work in January, when new state board members would begin a five-year term. Likewise, newly appointed county board members would be seated in January to serve for three years, with the power to install new county elections directors.

The timing gives new board members two months to prepare for the state’s March 5 primary. Legal delays would complicate that work, which played out in previous Cooper lawsuits related to voter redistricting maps.

Cooper, a lawyer by trade, is calling on the state Supreme Court to “reject the Legislature’s latest attempt to control the election process,” citing previous laws overturned by the court.

While Cooper and Democrats in the General Assembly say election administration is an executive function and predict gridlock from evenly split bipartisan boards, lawmakers have highlighted how the current system tilts the political balance in favor of the governor’s party and how the changes in SB749 would force bipartisan cooperation.

Newton has pointed to a settlement involving the Democratic majority state Board of Elections that extended the absentee ballot deadline to nine days after Election Day in 2020 as one example of why “SB749 is far more constitutional than what we have today.” Voters can get absentee ballots and begin returning them in September, having about two months in front of Election Day to cast votes.