(The Center Square) – Separate bills that would yield a better chance at final results being known on Election Day rather than in the following week, and giving both major parties equal number of picks to state and county election boards today are getting closer to a floor vote.
The Senate Redistricting and Elections Committee on Thursday adopted minor amendments and approved two separate bills aimed at restoring faith in elections. The legislation moves to the upper chamber’s rules committee, typically the final stop before a floor vote.
Gov. Roy Cooper has appointment authority for all 505 election board members – five at the state level, five for each of the 100 counties. The 65-year-old Democrat, lame duck in status the next year and a half, has attacked Senate bills 747 and 749 as unconstitutional “power grabs” designed to “ignore voters and rig elections.”
No Partisan Advantage in Elections would increase the State Board of Elections to eight members, with appointments split evenly between party leaders in both chambers of the General Assembly. County boards would be reduced to four members, using the same appointment process.
“I continue to be worried … it’s going to lead to gridlock,” Sen. Julie Mayfield, D-Buncombe, said Thursday.
Bill sponsor Sen. Paul Newton, R-Cabarrus, noted other effective bipartisan public bodies and reiterated the reasoning to shift away from partisan control.
“We’re probably better off with gridlock than one party pushing through a partisan agenda,” he said. “I think this is an opportunity for people to step back, remember who they represent, and find solutions.”
Newton also invited members to improve the legislation.
“If you have amendments, we’d like to get them over the weekend and include them, if we can,” he said.
Among dozens of proposed changes in SB747 is the elimination of the three-day grace period for absentee ballots to require them in the hands of election boards on Election Day, aligning North Carolina with more than 30 states with the same deadline.
Other changes would ban private funding in elections; remove non-citizens from voter rolls; permit public inspection of absentee ballots; increase the retention of election records to 22 months; strengthen the voter verification process for same-day ballots; and create two-factor authentication for absentee ballots by mail. The provisions regarding the absentee ballot deadline and private funding in elections were previously vetoed by Cooper in standalone bills.
Sen. Joyce Krawiec, R-Forsyth, pointed to issues with missing postmarks since the law was changed in 2009 to allow absentee ballots to be mailed on or before Election Day and received within three days.
“How can we say it’s a legit ballot three days later if they don’t have a postmark?” she questioned.
Representatives from American Majority and the North Carolina Elections Integrity Team testified in favor of the bills, while those from Common Cause North Carolina and the state’s Democratic Party opposed.
Kimberly Hardy, second vice chairwoman for the Democratic Party, said the legislation “amounts to an attempt to block people from having access to the ballot.”
“It violates the understanding of the separation of powers,” she said.
Dallas Woodhouse, executive director for the North Carolina branch of the conservative-leaning American Majority, has estimated about 9 in 10 voters would not notice a change. Only those who mail ballots and do so just before Election Day, and those who register and vote the same day, would experience change – a group estimated at less than 1 in 10.
