On Tuesday's All In show, MSNBC host Chris Hayes asserted that, since Republicans have taken control of the North Carolina state government, the state is moving toward becoming an "insane right-wing dystopia," and claimed that the GOP wants to engage in "voter suppression" in the state. Hayes:
It's a state that, to everyone's surprise, went blue in 2008 and was narrowly carried by Mitt Romney in 2012, a state viewed by many as an emerging Democratic foothold in the South, as evidenced by the party holding their convention in Charlotte in 2012. But a state that, since the election of Republican Governor Pat McCrory in late 2012 to preside over both a Republican house and a senate, has started to turn into an insane right-wing dystopia.
The gerrymandered right-wing state house cranking out legislation that looks like what you would expect if you handed over the reins of state governance to Red State commenters.
He soon continued:
But perhaps the most nefarious of all is the slew of voter suppression bills being churned out by state Republicans. Everything from a voter ID bill that has passed the house, to proposals to cut early voting and same-day registration.
A bit later, Hayes hosted a panel which included North Carolina NAACP President William Barber, who repeatedly made references to the South's era of racial segregation in attacking Republicans, as he invoked George Wallace, the Reconstruction period, and the Solid South.
Below is a transcript of the relevant portion of the Tuesday, April 30, All In with Chris Hayes show on MSNBC:
CHRIS HAYES: It's a state that, to everyone's surprise, went blue in 2008 and was narrowly carried by Mitt Romney in 2012, a state viewed by many as an emerging Democratic foothold in the South, as evidenced by the party holding their convention in Charlotte in 2012. But a state that, since the election of Republican Governor Pat McCrory in late 2012 to preside over both a Republican house and a senate, has started to turn into an insane right-wing dystopia.
The gerrymandered right-wing state house cranking out legislation that looks like what you would expect if you handed over the reins of state governance to Red State commenters.
Hundreds of millions in cuts to unemployment benefits. Drug tests for welfare recipients. A proposal to end public funding of judicial elections, supported by the governor. A proposal supported by the governor to eliminate the estate taxes of the 123 wealthiest families in the state. And that's after he already signed into law an end to the state's earned income tax credit, which will hike taxes on 900,000 working people. There's also proposals to limit access to abortions and an ill-fated effort to make Christianity the state religion.
But perhaps the most nefarious of all is the slew of voter suppression bills being churned out by state Republicans. Everything from a voter ID bill that has passed the house, to proposals to cut early voting and same-day registration.
The big mistake that Republicans across the country made in 2012, while trying desperately to rig the electorate in their favor, was attempting to get a number of shady voting bills through their respective state houses in the months before the election when everyone was paying attention and the media on full alert.
That attention transferred into a fierce backlash that turned into higher black voter turnout than white for the first time in history. Republicans, however, seem to have learned their lesson, and now realize the very best time to go after people's voting rights is the relatively quite months after the election when everyone's attention turns to other things.
This is precisely why the efforts in North Carolina to suppress the vote are so important to pay attention to. It's also why, to their great credit, groups like the NAACP and the Advancement Project are mobilizing in North Carolina to fight back when it matters most, when it is the most dangerous and when it is the hardest to get attention.
(...)
REVEREND WILLIAM BARBER, NORTH CAROLINA NAACP: I would say, first of all, that the reality is that's not how government is supposed to work because even when you have a majority, you cannot violate the Constitution. And what we see in this group of legislators is that they are acting like they are the George Wallace's of the 21st century. They're engaging in a Southern Strategy with a 21st century twist.
(...)
We built this coalition and we won same-day registration, we won early voting, we won Sunday voting, we pushed forward with more funding for education. And it's almost as though that for these people represents a kind of a third Reconstruction, and they're reacting to this now because they know that, with the dynamics in the state and the changing electorate, their time frame is limited. Black people represent 25 percent of the electorate, 70 percent of black people voted in 2012, even in losing some ways, and 69 percent of North Carolinians. And with the changing electorate, the time of ultraconservatism and the Solid South is almost over. So this is a tyrannical power grab to try to stop a future that they cannot stop.
