- House Republicans take advantage of two absent colleagues to override four gubernatorial vetoes.

And has the potential of Major League Baseball coming to North Carolina thrown a curve ball in budget bill negotiations?

This is State Lines.

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(upbeat music) ♪ - Welcome back to State Lines, I'm Kelly McCullen.

Joining me today, a great panel, Theresa Kostrweza of NC Capital Advantage, Representative Zack Hawkins from Durham County, to his right, Representative Allen Chesser of Nash County, and Colin Campbell of WUNC News.

I will say hello, welcome to the show, but any more words should be directed toward coverage.

Lots happening.

State House Republicans overrode four vetoes of legislation earlier this week.

Now, Republicans have been one vote short of a super majority needed for vote veto overrides, but on Wednesday, Representatives Carla Cunningham and Shelley Willingham missed the daily floor session.

They have been Democratic caucus votes in the past, but lost in the 2026 primary, when the state Democratic Party opposed the re-election.

The two absences created a three-fifths majority for the Republicans, and there goes Governor Stein's vetoes, just like that, Colin.

We can get into the bills a little bit later.

Tell me about this time-honored tradition of being sick, or what they call taking a walk.

- Yeah, so this was, these bills have been in what's called the veto garage for months now.

Destin Hall just biding his time, waiting for the right moment to call the votes, knowing that he wasn't gonna get 72 votes on these bills.

Both Cunningham and Willingham previously voted against all of them.

As far as we can tell, they haven't really changed their minds, but I think it's very notable that two lawmakers who were in the legislative building, at the committee meeting a couple hours before this, were nowhere to be found during the actual session.

I even went to their offices to see if they were over there, and their legislative aides wouldn't tell me where they had gone to.

So certainly, this seems like we may be seeing maybe something in the budget, something that these two lawmakers were looking for, but when you're a lame duck, you can do what you want, and what they wanted to do here was skip this vote and let these bills become law.

- I can just see you going into those offices asking, "Where are they?"

Representative Chancellor, you're in leadership.

Did Willingham and Cunningham, they tipped you off, didn't they?

- Not me, no.

So it's pretty simple.

We've got a voting schedule that we've held to.

It's public, and it says the days that we'll be voting and when we'll be voting, and we expect everybody to be in their seats.

If we didn't have all the Republicans in our seats, we wouldn't be able to do it.

- The timing, was it strictly timing with them choosing to give, they gave you the 3/5 majority, but there's been no other time in the session this spring where you had a 3/5 majority and the Speaker or leadership decided not to pursue an override.

- No, I mean, we had override sessions a little bit earlier in the session as well.

So it's just a matter of knowing the count, knowing where your votes are, and knowing who's in the room.

It's just part of the game.

- Representative Hawkins, on the Democratic side, Ms.

Cunningham's not a Democrat anymore.

So you knew this was coming?

- No, just as surprised as everyone else.

And it's unfortunate that there were enough seats on the Republican side, but not enough seats on our side and the one on the affiliate to stop this bill, because I voted against every single one of them.

I mean, they're taking North Carolina in the wrong direction.

And regardless if they were there or not, those vetoes moving forward take away from people's ability to talk about things like affordability, right?

And all the things that are really, really important.

- When do you as a Democrat, you know the leadership too, and you're climbing the ranks of power, and when do you go, "Uh-oh, we don't have the math"?

- Well, I mean, I think when you start looking around and you realize that the governor, not the governor, but the speaker has gaveled in, we go through our process and people still are not in their seats.

And generally, sometimes I've come into the building late as well.

But at the end of the day, I think when we got to the votes and we realized that they weren't there, that it was gonna be an issue.

A lot of people were gonna be hurt by those actions.

- That situation is the instinct to have someone in the caucus jump up, or do you just realize what's happened and just sit back and ride?

- I would think that they, very similar to the other caucus.

Everyone starts to do their votes, everyone has whips, everyone starts reaching out.

- Whipping is vote counting, right?

- Whipping is vote counting, that is correct.

- But it's also making sure that you have people in place, right?

Which is different also than vote counting.

And so I think, again, the thing that people need to realize is that bills like this do nothing for people's pockets.

They don't give them anything of substance and it takes away from the major pieces of affordability, having a budget, and all those things that really, really matter.

- Theresa, in the recent past, this has happened before.

Republicans have taken a walk.

I seem to remember the Senate was able to pass a lottery because two gentlemen were gone one day.

- Yep, yeah.

- Explain this.

- This is not unusual, that's the thing.

Every party has done it whenever they needed to do it, whether it's to get some sort of legislation across the line like the lottery.

I remember that day very clearly and Senator Woodson had a knee problem.

- Was it Garwood?

- Yes, John Garwood, that's exactly right.

But the point of this is, this is what the people in power do.

And I don't know if you, every day, you're asking representatives Cunningham and Willingham, hey, are you gonna be here today?

And they tell you yes or no.

But otherwise, this is what the Republicans are waiting for.

They are waiting for the opportunity to get their agenda through.

And it was just a matter of time.

That veto garage, that door is up and down, up and down.

- Would Democrats do the same thing if they were in power, Theresa?

- 100%.

- Three of the four previously vetoed bills targeted diversity, equity, and inclusion programs across state agencies, public education, and the university system, which this station here is part of the university system.

Let's start with House Bill 171, bans DEI mandates in state agencies, directs the government to conduct merit-based hiring and promotions.

In Senate Bill 227, public schools will be closing any DEI offices and eliminating related jobs.

Tax funding could not support what's called discriminatory training programs.

And Senate Bill 558 eliminates DEI programs across the UNC system, protecting free speech, they say, because universities then can no longer maintain reporting programs where investigations of speech content can be launched.

Theresa, right back to you.

Roll 'em all into one, Bill.

Now, this is interesting because Representative Willingham and Cunningham are African-American, and the DEI bills went with their absence.

Is that a coincidence in your opinion?

- Oh, it's a complete coincidence, yes.

Yeah, it was not-- - Well, DEI is a very polarizing among racial grounds at times.

- Before I jump into the topic, I wanna say one last thing about the process.

So, you know, I heard this term back when I was in school, so I brushed up on my Latin before coming on the show, which is, it's a Latin term, victoris bolleus, which roughly translates to the victor go the spoils.

And in this case, the Republicans are the victors, but the other victors are, these two representatives are mad, and they are extracting their revenge on the Democratic Party for having singled them out.

And, you know, it's kind of a too bad, so sad moment, but that's what happens when you play the game of politics this way.

- To the DEI bills, now that they are state law, that is a product of those two representatives walking in.

Is she right?

They got you back.

- Well, at the end of the day, voters in districts make decisions, period.

And-- - That is so well said.

- I think, again, the issue that we need to think about, and as I started before, diversity, equity, inclusion is something that everyone should want.

If you're a kid from, you know, Nash County, or a kid from Buncombe County, you want to make sure that someone is finding you and not just picking the best and the brightest to go to the best schools from Durham, Orange, Wake, and Charlotte.

Does that make sense?

And I think the opportunity, you know, eliminating these kinds of programs for me, really, is taking people away from being valued and welcomed in North Carolina.

And so I represent RTP.

I'll say a few quick things.

They want the best and the brightest in their jobs, and in state government, we should be wanting to make sure that we have a reflective society in our workforce in the state of North Carolina.

We should be a model employer.

- Three state laws on the books now.

What's the net effect?

- I think it's a positive effect.

I think we're keeping in with case rulings as well.

People keep forgetting that, you know, the courts have already ruled that you cannot select a jury based off a race.

You can't make sure that the jury, you can't have someone dismissed from jury duty because the jury is all of a sudden too white or too black.

And so when we prioritize these things, we do punish, I believe, the best and the brightest.

I think we have to level the playing field and make sure everyone has an opportunity to compete.

That's one thing that we all agree on, is that everyone should have equal opportunity to compete and equal opportunity to succeed.

That means we can't cut the legs out from under anyone.

- And that fourth vetoed bill, which is now state law, will require state law enforcement officials to cooperate with those federal immigration agents.

It's called ICE.

The law would also ban illegal or undocumented immigrants from receiving some state-funded public assistance.

But that some includes Medicaid, housing assistance, childcare subsidies, and no UNC system campus could declare itself a sanctuary campus.

A lot rolled into that bill.

Back to you, Representative.

Now state law, that seems like hodgepodge.

It's a lot.

- It is a lot.

I think at its core, it's basically ensuring that law enforcement follows federal law.

I was a law enforcement officer and there was no federal law that I was allowed to overlook.

And so for some reason now, all of a sudden, we take what, for lack of a better term, I'll call executive privilege, for law enforcement officers or different departments to say, well, we're not gonna cooperate with this federal law.

In no other area of the law are we allowed to do that.

And so I think what we're doing is we're bringing everything back into proper alignment and saying we're going to enforce the law because that's the job.

- Colin, in that case, if local law enforcement or state law enforcement will not, it includes local law enforcement, right?

Okay.

If they don't listen to the feds, the feds are big and scary and bring troops to your cities.

Why would they listen to a state law?

- Well, they're subject to a lot of the state-level stuff.

They're federal law enforcement answers to the feds, state law enforcement answers, in some cases, to the governor or other state agencies.

And so this sort of, I guess, puts more teeth into what they do and how much power they have to potentially say no to a federal agency, more or less diminished by this.

- Theresa, ICE cooperation, that will play well with Republican voters this fall.

Can legislators take this back home and try to bolster up some of those mildly red districts for re-election?

- Oh, absolutely they can.

And they will.

And that's what happens when you pass laws that you think that your members can use for re-election.

The Democrats do it, the Republicans do it.

It doesn't really matter.

Part of your job when you're a leader is to give the members of your caucus things to go home and run on, right?

Or to run against.

- Sure.

- You know what I mean?

So you're in a perfect situation.

You've got a lot to run against with these veto overrides.

And they've got stuff to run for.

- That's right.

Well, I hope they like spending time with their families 'cause I think they're gonna cost themselves 10 seats by not having a state budget on time.

And moving forward with bills that do not put money in people's pockets.

- These bills are an interesting double-edged sword politically because on the one hand, they're gonna be very popular with the Republican base.

So if you're worried about Republican turnout on a midterm year like this, this helps you on that front.

But in terms of people in the middle, that may cost a few votes depending on how sort of moderates view these particular issues.

- Final word.

- I think with the statement he made about not putting money back in people's pockets, I think actually this bill does that by protecting the safety net.

Keeping it out of the hands of non-citizens and preserving it for the citizens that we've actually built the system to protect and to provide for.

- Let's check in on the state budget negotiations next where there's attention this week on a possible major league baseball stadium, maybe for the Triangle Area.

House and Senate leaders are clearly discussing whether to include stadium funding in the '26-'27 budget.

This is certainly a new wrinkle or addition to the other issues that are being hammered out in the budget or are hammered out.

Senator Phil Berger says public financing's likely a necessary evil to lure an expansion team.

That's just the game.

But House Speaker Destin Hall isn't so sure of public financing unless he can be promised their economic benefits.

Representative Hawkins, baseball in the Triangle.

You going for some public funding for a stadium in the hopes of beating Nashville and Portland and Montreal for a baseball team?

- Sure, well I mean I would hope that we would.

I mean I would love to have baseball on the Triangle.

But at the end of the day, we have to prioritize public education.

And so I think if we know that we are viable, then we should move.

But this isn't something that should hold up any budget process.

We have money in reserve, we have money in the sports betting bills.

Like we have the resources that can help move this forward if we're gonna be one of the top three cities.

We don't even know that yet.

But what we do know is again, people are looking for a budget, people are looking for investments in startups, people are looking for investments in public education.

And I don't think that a major league baseball team, if we're not again on top of Nashville and in front of Montreal, is a priority right now.

- What is the House position, Representative Chesser?

It seems not a no, it seems skeptical and you need details.

That's what the speaker seems to suggest.

- I just don't think we have enough information.

I think Representative Hawkins alluded to it.

Like one, the decision from MLB whether or not they're going to expand is later, not now.

So we don't even have that information available to us.

We don't know where we would rank against our competitors yet.

I think we've sent plenty of signal that we're willing to compete if the opportunity presents itself.

And again, to Representative Hawkins' point, I think there are other priorities to be considered.

And I would hope that this would not hold up the budget.

- Well, does anybody, my understanding is different.

My understanding is that it's actually not any money.

We're not talking about X million or hundreds of millions of dollars that's going to go in this year's budget.

It's merely a framework for financing if in fact expansion happens and we are chosen.

Nothing happens if we're not chosen.

So I kind of don't understand what the big deal is unless it's just being used as a us versus them, House versus the Senate thing, 'cause it's not real dollars.

Am I missing something?

- What I've been hearing is that there's talk of two pieces of this.

One is allowing Wake County to increase their occupancy tax rate to fund this to some degree at the local level.

And the other is, could you take money out of an economic investment reserve fund the state has for this type of project when that money would normally go to, say, a project that's gonna bring 1,000 jobs and build manufacturing facilities.

So that's what I'm hearing, but it's all happening behind closed doors.

- But it's not money.

It's not actual money that's going for this and not something else.

And it's not gonna happen if it doesn't happen.

- Everything right now is House versus Senate.

I wanna say that.

- Yeah, for sure.

- Two House members.

But a framework, is that a promise?

That if you approve the framework, the expectation will be you can be on the hook with hundreds of millions of state dollars.

- If we obligate the money, then there's always opportunity costs.

We always then give up the opportunity to do something else with that money while it's obligated for another project.

And so I think that we're just in a wait and see situation 'cause we just don't have the information to make the decision.

- Does anyone think a baseball team would bring a net benefit to a city?

You'd have to assume.

- Oh, for sure.

- I don't think there's any disagreement on that.

- Again, my best friend Claude, right?

I asked Claude about public financing of stadiums when you're talking about any sort of expansion team.

And there's always some dollars.

It doesn't matter how big or how small, but whether it's infrastructure or it's financing help or that sort of thing, major league sports are now so ginormous in this country and there are billions and billions and billions of dollars.

And so some public financing is needed.

Doesn't mean you're buying the stadium for them, but something is needed.

- Colin, it would seem lots of people in the Raleigh area would like a baseball stadium.

And then you talk the money and it is serious amounts of money when there's a hospital out there.

Then there's always a road somewhere to be repaved.

- Yeah, and then the question is, does the additional revenue that comes offset that or does it come to sort of, I've heard concerns from the conservative John Locke Foundation that it's gonna benefit the businesses right around the stadium in downtown Raleigh, but might not benefit somebody who's running a business 30 miles away or somebody who lives halfway across the state and is never gonna go to a ball game.

- Well, ask them.

I mean, would you think it would benefit your town?

- There's gonna be tax revenues that are generated from it that then will get redistributed across the state.

- And do the Durham Bulls lose traffic from having a major league team down the road?

- Yeah, we don't think so.

I mean, Durham Bulls is the institution.

People just love going to that stadium.

I do think the ability to have, you know, butts in beds and for hospitality, that's gonna help his region, that'll help my region, that'll help Orange County.

I mean, I think within an hour, it will have a net benefit.

It's just that very similar to Representative Chesser, it's just we don't have enough information to like obligate ourselves down the road, you know, for down the road.

We can't do that right now.

- Does it go away if it's not in the budget this cycle, do you think?

Are we talking 2027?

We'll be discussing possibly-- - I think as long as we stay warm on the issue, we should be fine.

- North Carolina's US Senator Ted Budd says he'll be stalling federal supplemental spending legislation over Hurricane Helene relief funding for Western North Carolina.

The Trump administration wants an $88 billion spending bill passed to fund the Iran war, offer farm subsidies, even help fight Ebola.

This bill will be blocked.

Senator Budd says he supports the provisions in the spending bill, but is disappointed Western North Carolina would receive zero relief funding.

Budd and Senator Thom Tillis have apparently asked Congress to come back to DC to address this oversight.

All right, Theresa, we got Ted Budd now stalling the Trump agenda after he was endorsed by Donald Trump.

We have an active Senate race out there with Mr.

Whatley who says, "If you elect me, I'm here because Donald Trump needs his agenda supported."

Where do you stand if you're a Republican voter?

- Well, I think the question really is where do you stand if you're a citizen of the state of North Carolina?

- Take it back to that.

- From that standpoint, good job, Senator Budd, for standing up to the president and to the administration that is delaying this much needed relief for citizens of North Carolina.

And one thing I will say about our state, having witnessed now so many natural disasters, is I've noticed party doesn't matter.

And it really is about that we're all North Carolinians.

No matter what part of the state we're from, we want to help each other.

And that's the way it should always be.

And so, you know, Senator Budd and Senator Tillis are doing absolutely the right thing.

- Yeah, I completely agree.

I was very pleased to see that he was willing to stand up for the people of Western North Carolina.

The only thing that I hope is, I think I can't remember the senator's name, just this week, who stood up to the president and-- - Cassidy.

- Cassidy.

- Louisiana.

- Cassidy.

And I was like, "Go Cassidy."

And the next thing I know, he had a meeting and he flipped his vote.

And so I hope that there's no amount of pressure that Budd will surrender this stance.

Because if you go out to Western North Carolina, for some places, especially places like Chimney Rock or South Asheville, it looks like it just happened.

And so these people are trying to really rebuild their lives and the money that the state has put forward needs to be supplanted by, you know, things like those monies that come out of D.C.

- Representative Chesser, how well do you know Ted Budd?

- I know him pretty well.

- What kind of guy is he when it comes down to that kind of pressure to go public to say, "We're stopping this bill to help Helene"?

Does he get it or is there gonna be a pressure campaign and what do you expect him to do if he's pressured?

- So absolutely there'll be a pressure campaign.

But what he's doing is he's standing on principle.

And that's one thing I know about Ted is he's a principled person.

And so he has made a promise to the state, and Thom Tillis both, and even the president made a promise to bring funds to Helene Recovery and to help us solve this problem.

And so this is him using political leverage and legislative leverage properly to force that, excuse me, to force that conversation and to force the fulfillment of that promise.

- But I can't be the only person out there who thought about this and contrasted against the ongoing U.S.

Senate campaign and how that was set up.

- Is campaigning versus governing.

- That's it.

- Take it there, Representative.

- Yeah, so I mean, I would encourage the campaign to support the people who are going to be voting for them in November.

- Roy Cooper's the real victor in this.

- Even though it's Ted Budd and Ted Budd's not running for it.

- No, but the whole thing is it just points to that on day two of President Trump's presidency, he looked at Michael Whatley and said, I'm putting you in charge of taking care of North Carolina for Hurricane Helene relief.

And now we're at this point almost two years later.

- That's right, which shows he has the ear of the president and he's still not moving.

- But Colin, President Trump changes policies, decisions.

He puts leaders in and out of those big departments, to your point, but I wanted to offer that counterpoint.

What happened out in Western North Carolina?

Is it on, obviously it's not on track, have a US Senator's bucking his own president.

- Yeah, and the problem too is like this, we're talking about additional money now, but a lot of the money that's been allocated so far has not gotten down to where it needs to go.

So you see Governor Stein going to DC and trying to push federal agencies to release this funding that's already been appropriated by Congress.

Obviously there's a need for a lot more and Western North Carolina and Helene are getting a fraction of the federal assistance that you've seen in previous hurricanes.

Like there's just not as much federal money to help out.

And when you have $60 billion plus in damage, you have to have federal money.

The legislature cannot do that on its own.

- It's not a time to be a libertarian, I guess.

- It is not.

- I just want to double back.

This isn't a final solution here.

This is a governmental process to force the conversation.

And so let's see where that conversation goes.

- Well, I mean, I think again, he's doing the right thing by standing up to the Trump administration, because just as Colin mentioned, we are in Western North Carolina is in dire straits.

And as the governor says, there's nothing that we won't do, but our coffers are limited.

And so we have to get the federal government to move enough quickly.

- I want to touch on this topic.

It's a local issue, but it comes from the Lumbee nation.

The tribal voters down in Robinson County rejected a plan to build a casino resort down there.

62% of local voters rejected what was actually, I understand a Lumbee constitutional amendment vote with 38% approved.

There are over 55,000 enrolled members of the Lumbee tribe and any tribal member over 18 years old can vote, but less than 9,000 people voted, Colin.

Tribal leader John Lowry supported the casino project heavily, but says he will not be revisiting the issue over the final 18 months of his term leading the Lumbee tribe.

Did we see that coming?

Because for years it was, if you get federally recognized, the I-95 corridor will be an economic center.

- Yeah, and certainly Robinson County needs as many jobs as can get.

This is one of the poorer areas of the state.

The Lumbee tribe had already spent millions to buy land right on I-95 shortly after they got federal recognition.

This seemed to a lot of us on the outside as sort of a done deal, but reading what I've read about the opposition movement within the Lumbee tribe, a lot of them weren't necessarily 100% opposed to a casino.

They just didn't really like the process around this.

So I don't know that this is a dead issue.

It may be for the next couple of years, but there's still maybe some efforts to make this happen.

I mean, the other alternative for the Lumbee is to try to use that site for economic development.

But at that point, if you're just trying to get a manufacturing facility, you're competing with every other exit along I-95.

- I've got a couple of minutes.

All politics really are local in this case, but why would only 20% of voters or low turnout, why would it be so low for such a big issue?

- Well, I think one, it was just a quick turnaround on the vote from the notice to the vote.

It's not that it was unnecessarily short, but there just wasn't a lot of information out there about it.

I'm not part of the tribe, so I don't know about their internal communications, but I think this isn't a no, it's a not now is the answer that the Lumbees received.

And I think it's an exercise in their sovereignty to pick what the tribe's future is going to be collectively.

- Are casinos just simply popular in some places in this state and in other places that really desire them, the voters are not going to allow it?

- I don't think that's the case.

I mean, I think most people, because North Carolina doesn't have a lot of casinos, I think that North Carolina is open to it, but this was just a matter of process.

We went through this with the sports betting bill.

It took us two terms to pass the bill.

The first term is that people just didn't like the process.

And so he has to govern, and he made the right decision to not take this up again and try to force the issue.

But people want to make sure that they feel good about the process and good about the outcome because they have to live with it.

And so I think that if he goes back and has a chance to listen to his constituents, we should be fine.

And next thing you know, in a few years, he should have exactly what they want.

- Theresa, 30 seconds, last word to you.

- Well, the thing, it kind of reminds me of actually what happened to Senator Berger is that it comes back to process and transparency, right?

And to do something so major and not having spent a lot of time and let the members, let the tribe members actually talk about it.

I mean, let's face it, they're new to being a federally recognized tribe.

And so it was probably too soon of a vote and they didn't spend enough time.

- That's our show.

Thank you, panelists.

Great conversation, a lot of topics.

I know you have an opinion.

statelines@pbsnc.org is the email.

I do read every email and I'll share with this crowd.

I'm Kelly McCullen.

Thanks for watching.

I'll see you next time.

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