By Staff
In a new poll by North Carolina’s blue chip polling outfit, Public Policy Polling, the people of North Carolina have shown their marked displeasure with our current state government, with particular ire reserved for the legislature which is led by the largest Republican majority in North Carolina history. Much of this disappointment was focused like a laser over the last two weeks when the State Senate and the General Assembly inserted language restricting access to abortion services into a nonsense bill about Sharia Law and a motor-cycle safety bill respectively.
The hit in approval numbers has been across the board effecting Governor Pat McCrory and both house of the North Carolina legislature. Much of their legislative agenda from refusing to allow North Carolinians to benefit from Federal unemployment compensation to their attacks on voting rights have begun to cause blow-back.
Transparency and process have also begun to cut into support from Independents. Only 19% of voters across the board think the body is transparent in how it conducts its business to 51% who believe it is not. As a result North Carolinians think by a 48/33 margin that McCrory should veto the abortion law, including a 51/37 margin among independents.
55% of voters across the board are unhappy with Republican legislation that resulted in 70,000 North Carolinians losing their unemployment benefits earlier with only 29% indicating that they are supportive of it. There’s strong opposition to this development by both independents (32/55) and Democrats (10/78).
76% of voters think that petrochemical companies who wish to frack in North Carolina should be required to disclose all the chemicals they inject into the ground with only 13% opposed. Republicans in the State Senate have been trying to exempt them from having to do so. In a rare, across the board, bipartisan consensus (81/13 among independents, 80/9 among Democrats, 68/18 among Republicans) that disclosure should be required. The only other issue agreed on by North Carolinans across party lines was the idea of drug testing members of the State Senate and the General Assembly. 78% support mandatory drug testing for members of the General Assembly to only 12% opposed and that sentiment is held by independents (84/11), Republicans (83/9), and Democrats (70/15) alike. This is, of course, in response to Republican plans to require drug testing those who receive unemployment and SNAP benefits.
How are the Moral Monday demonstrations reading across the state? On Monday over 2,000 demonstrators showed up in force led by women wearing pink and focusing on last week’s “sneak attack” on women’s reproductive rights by the NC legislature. According to PPP the protesters are more popular with Independents and Democrats than either the General Assembly or the Governor. 47% of those polled have a favorable opinion of Moral Monday demonstrators who have been getting arrested protesting the General Assembly’s actions to 40% with an unfavorable opinion and by a 47/41 margin voters say they have a higher opinion of the protesters than they do of the General Assembly. Those numbers may be a reflection of the sentiment North Carolinians hold by a 46/36 margin that the General Assembly is causing North Carolina ‘national embarrassment’ with legislation about non-existent problems like Sharia Law, establishing a state religion in NC, placing the General Assembly’s authority above that of the Constitution of the United States, and other legislation that has tended toward the ridiculous from nipples to instructing teachers to lie to their students about risks incurred by women who go through an abortion procedure.
Following a series of gaffes from getting caught throwing baseballs while ducking out on some North Carolina kids to a silly lie about having been in the crowd at Moral Mondays, to his tepid, substance-free response to the New York Times’ scathing editorial titled The Decline of North Carolina. According to PPP’s results all of these mistakes as well as broken campaign promises on abortion restrictions and “tax reform” have begun to pile up and effect the Governor’s approval ratings in a substantial way. As summarized by PPP:
For the first time since taking office we find that McCrory has a negative approval rating this month. Only 40% of voters are happy with the job he’s doing to 49% who disapprove. That’s down a net 15 points from June when he was at a 45/39 spread. While McCrory’s numbers are pretty steady with Republicans, he continues to lose ground with Democrats (down a net 17 points from -36 at 24/60 last month to now -53 at 17/70) and independents (down a net 20 points from +12 at 46/34 last month to -8 at 41/49 now). Only 68% of people who voted for McCrory last fall continue to approve of his job performance.
It should be noted that one-termer Governor Bev Perdue posted the weakest numbers of her entire administration at this time four years ago with 25% of voters approving and 55% disapproving of her. Perdue’s numbers never entered the black again for her entire term, including after she announced she would not run for reelection.
With only 41% of those polled responding that they voted for Gov. McCrory’s opponent in the last election while 52% said they voted for McCrory the 12% loss of support for McCrory is stunning in that it didn’t even take a year in the hot seat for McCrory’s numbers to begin to nose-dive.
53% of those who responded indicated that they were women. 44% of those polled said that they were between the ages of 46 to 65. Put together with the fact that 77% of voters polled were white the profile for the majority of respondents looks to be white women between the ages of 46 to 65- a group that Republicans must own to maintain their grip on total power. Recent legislation seen by many as particularly targeting women such as the new abortion restrictions and the repeal of “Tax Free Day” for school supplies it does not seem that the NCGOP has any real concern or plan for retaining and wooing thiese voters.
Right now those polled would vote for an un-named Democrat over an Un-named Republican 45/35 with 20% of the respondents hostile to both parties. 22% of those polled were in the 336 area code making us here in Forsyth County one of the highest sampled areas.
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