North Carolina's GOP veto-proof supermajority falters following election

Democrats in North Carolina have lost seats in the Senate. But they appear to have flipped at least one crucial seat in the House, potentially altering the balance of power with newly elected Governor Josh Stein. As of Wednesday, unofficial results showed Democrats in North Carolina’s House of Representatives held leads in a few races, beginning with Republican Rep. Frank Sossamon trailing Democrat Bryan Cohn in Vance County. Democrat Beth Gardner Helfrich was ahead of Republican Melinda Bales in Mecklenburg, and Democrat Dante Pittman led Republican Rep. Ken Fontenot in Wilson. Republican Senate leader Phil Berger told the News & Observer that his party will retain a supermajority in the Senate and a strong majority in the House. 

To learn more, WFDD’s David Ford spoke with High Point University Interdisciplinary Survey Research Center Director Martin Kifer.

Interview Highlights

On what the loss of a supermajority in the House while maintaining it in the Senate means:

"If you don't lose that threshold in the Senate, it means it's easier to pass things that are of policy relevance and policy priorities for the senators. Then they go over to the House, and the House will pass them at whatever threshold they can. The difficulty for the General Assembly and getting exactly what they want is then the governor does have the option of vetoing something that comes over from the General Assembly, and then the House with just a partisan party-line vote would not be able to override that veto. And so that probably prompts some more negotiation, at least some other steps in terms of what the General Assembly would have to do to make sure that they're doing something that can pass into law."

On likely scenarios that may play out in light of the current makeup of the House and Senate:

"It's quite possible that all the relevant players here — you know both houses, the General Assembly and the governor — are going to spend some time feeling things out, figure out what the likelihood is that the Senate can pass things at such a high threshold that the House can pass things at a particular level, and maybe even bring some Democrats along with them. And then what the governor feels like he can tolerate in terms of policy within those laws that the General Assembly is passing, because it's quite possible, you can look at a law and say it's like, 'Okay, well, that's not really what I want, but it's not so bad, and so I'm going to sign it, or I'm going to let it pass into law. We're not going to have a fight.' The General Assembly, on the other hand, can say, 'Okay, well, maybe we work with the governor, because we really want to get something passed on this, but we don't have to have it exactly what our top priorities are.'"

On getting the veto-proof supermajority back:

"Well, you would probably have to lose those seats that were turned over, you know, there in the House. So, it could be more, or could be fewer seats that the GOP would have to turn in order to get to that threshold. It'll depend on how many it is, and also it'll depend on the ambitions of whoever it is that they try and draw in, you know, to this new majority."