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Nonpartisan Elections vs. The DOJ
Kinston nonpartisan issue goes national
Washington Times article leads to Rush Limbaugh, FoxNews.com, others picking up story
October 21, 2009 12:00 AM
Bryan C. Hanks
Managing Editor
On Monday, only a few thousand people knew about Kinston’s nonpartisan voting issue. Following national exposure on Tuesday by conservative talk show host Rush Limbaugh and throughout the Internet, millions of people across the United States know about the issue.
During August, the U.S. Department of Justice overturned last November’s election in which Kinston voters overwhelmingly voted for nonpartisan elections. While the issue has received local attention, it was virtually unknown throughout the nation.
That is, until Tuesday. Ben Conery, a reporter with the Washington Times, spent three days in Kinston last week investigating the issue and his article appeared in his newspaper and at washingtontimes.com on Tuesday.
That’s where Limbaugh read the article and then talked about the issue in two different segments for about 20 minutes on his program.
“(The DOJ) essentially said to the people of Kinston, N.C., ‘Sorry, we don’t think you’re smart enough to know what you are doing,’ ” Limbaugh told his audience, which reaches an estimated 13 million listeners. “The latest news is that Kinston will not fight this ruling and will not stand for their own sovereignty, if you will; they are bowing to the Obama Justice Department.”
Lenoir County Commissioner Tommy Pharo, an executive with Minges Bottling, was traveling between business calls in Jones County when he heard Limbaugh mention Kinston in the show’s first hour.
“I heard him say, ‘Kinston, N.C.,’ and I had to pull over,” Pharo said. “He was very critical of the decision, as am I, and he was not in favor of it.”
Following Limbaugh’s statements and the Times article, the news spread like wildfire over the Internet. FoxNews.com, the National Review, GOPUSA and several other Web sites picked up the story, provoking dozens of reader comments on those sites.
Former state representative Stephen LaRoque, who headed the nonpartisan bid, said he was surprised it took more than two months for the story to reach a national audience.
“I had hoped it would’ve happened a little sooner than this, but sometimes things take time and other news pre-empt it,” said LaRoque, who was interviewed extensively by Conery for the Times report.
LaRoque said he hoped the national exposure given to the nonpartisan issue would help to move the Kinston City Council towards appealing the DOJ’s decision. Of the five Kinston City Council members, only Will Barker voted for an appeal; the other four council members — Joseph Tyson, Alice Tingle, Robert A. Swinson IV and current mayoral candidate Jimmy Cousins — voted to table the vote for an appeal at a later date.
“I would like to think it will change the minds of the Council to where they will actually support the voters,” LaRoque said. “But from their actions after the ruling came down, it’s not encouraging.
“If we can put together a case of individual voters appealing this decision who would stand in court, we could go around the city council and get justice for the voters.”
Tingle said she had not made up her mind if she would vote to untable the appeal, if it came back up on a city council meeting agenda.
“I can truly say that it does not matter to me if we are partisan or nonpartisan; either way, I can live with it,” Tingle said. “I’m one that would rather not go into districts, because I would like to be voted at-large. I want people to represent the entire community.”
Bryan C. Hanks can be reached at 252-559-1074 or at bhanks@freedomenc.com. For more on this subject, check out Bryan’s blog at bhanks.encblogs.com.
Washington Times article leads to Rush Limbaugh, FoxNews.com, others picking up story
October 21, 2009 12:00 AM
Bryan C. Hanks
Managing Editor
On Monday, only a few thousand people knew about Kinston’s nonpartisan voting issue. Following national exposure on Tuesday by conservative talk show host Rush Limbaugh and throughout the Internet, millions of people across the United States know about the issue.
During August, the U.S. Department of Justice overturned last November’s election in which Kinston voters overwhelmingly voted for nonpartisan elections. While the issue has received local attention, it was virtually unknown throughout the nation.
That is, until Tuesday. Ben Conery, a reporter with the Washington Times, spent three days in Kinston last week investigating the issue and his article appeared in his newspaper and at washingtontimes.com on Tuesday.
That’s where Limbaugh read the article and then talked about the issue in two different segments for about 20 minutes on his program.
“(The DOJ) essentially said to the people of Kinston, N.C., ‘Sorry, we don’t think you’re smart enough to know what you are doing,’ ” Limbaugh told his audience, which reaches an estimated 13 million listeners. “The latest news is that Kinston will not fight this ruling and will not stand for their own sovereignty, if you will; they are bowing to the Obama Justice Department.”
Lenoir County Commissioner Tommy Pharo, an executive with Minges Bottling, was traveling between business calls in Jones County when he heard Limbaugh mention Kinston in the show’s first hour.
“I heard him say, ‘Kinston, N.C.,’ and I had to pull over,” Pharo said. “He was very critical of the decision, as am I, and he was not in favor of it.”
Following Limbaugh’s statements and the Times article, the news spread like wildfire over the Internet. FoxNews.com, the National Review, GOPUSA and several other Web sites picked up the story, provoking dozens of reader comments on those sites.
Former state representative Stephen LaRoque, who headed the nonpartisan bid, said he was surprised it took more than two months for the story to reach a national audience.
“I had hoped it would’ve happened a little sooner than this, but sometimes things take time and other news pre-empt it,” said LaRoque, who was interviewed extensively by Conery for the Times report.
LaRoque said he hoped the national exposure given to the nonpartisan issue would help to move the Kinston City Council towards appealing the DOJ’s decision. Of the five Kinston City Council members, only Will Barker voted for an appeal; the other four council members — Joseph Tyson, Alice Tingle, Robert A. Swinson IV and current mayoral candidate Jimmy Cousins — voted to table the vote for an appeal at a later date.
“I would like to think it will change the minds of the Council to where they will actually support the voters,” LaRoque said. “But from their actions after the ruling came down, it’s not encouraging.
“If we can put together a case of individual voters appealing this decision who would stand in court, we could go around the city council and get justice for the voters.”
Tingle said she had not made up her mind if she would vote to untable the appeal, if it came back up on a city council meeting agenda.
“I can truly say that it does not matter to me if we are partisan or nonpartisan; either way, I can live with it,” Tingle said. “I’m one that would rather not go into districts, because I would like to be voted at-large. I want people to represent the entire community.”
Bryan C. Hanks can be reached at 252-559-1074 or at bhanks@freedomenc.com. For more on this subject, check out Bryan’s blog at bhanks.encblogs.com.
The Washington Times article:
Justice concludes black voters need Democratic Party
U.S. blocks N.C. city's nonpartisan vote
By Ben Conery
KINSTON, N.C. | Voters in this small city decided overwhelmingly last year to do away with the party affiliation of candidates in local elections, but the Obama administration recently overruled the electorate and decided that equal rights for black voters cannot be achieved without the Democratic Party.
The Justice Department's ruling, which affects races for City Council and mayor, went so far as to say partisan elections are needed so that black voters can elect their "candidates of choice" - identified by the department as those who are Democrats and almost exclusively black.
The department ruled that white voters in Kinston will vote for blacks only if they are Democrats and that therefore the city cannot get rid of party affiliations for local elections because that would violate black voters' right to elect the candidates they want.
Several federal and local politicians would like the city to challenge the decision in court. They say voter apathy is the largest barrier to black voters' election of candidates they prefer and that the Justice Department has gone too far in trying to influence election results here.
Stephen LaRoque, a former Republican state lawmaker who led the drive to end partisan local elections, called the Justice Department's decision "racial as well as partisan."
"On top of that, you have an unelected bureaucrat in Washington, D.C., overturning a valid election," he said. "That is un-American."
The decision, made by the same Justice official who ordered the dismissal of a voting rights case against members of the New Black Panther Party in Philadelphia, has irritated other locals as well. They bristle at federal interference in this city of nearly 23,000 people, two-thirds of whom are black.
In interviews in sleepy downtown Kinston - a place best known as a road sign on the way to the Carolina beaches - residents said partisan voting is largely unimportant because people are personally acquainted with their elected officials and are familiar with their views.
"To begin with, 'nonpartisan elections' is a misconceived and deceiving statement because even though no party affiliation shows up on a ballot form, candidates still adhere to certain ideologies and people understand that, and are going to identify with who they feel has their best interest at heart," said William Cooke, president of the Kinston/Lenoir County branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.
Mr. Cooke said his group does not take a position on this issue and would not disclose his personal stance, but expressed skepticism about the Justice Department's involvement.
U.S. blocks N.C. city's nonpartisan vote
By Ben Conery
KINSTON, N.C. | Voters in this small city decided overwhelmingly last year to do away with the party affiliation of candidates in local elections, but the Obama administration recently overruled the electorate and decided that equal rights for black voters cannot be achieved without the Democratic Party.
The Justice Department's ruling, which affects races for City Council and mayor, went so far as to say partisan elections are needed so that black voters can elect their "candidates of choice" - identified by the department as those who are Democrats and almost exclusively black.
The department ruled that white voters in Kinston will vote for blacks only if they are Democrats and that therefore the city cannot get rid of party affiliations for local elections because that would violate black voters' right to elect the candidates they want.
Several federal and local politicians would like the city to challenge the decision in court. They say voter apathy is the largest barrier to black voters' election of candidates they prefer and that the Justice Department has gone too far in trying to influence election results here.
Stephen LaRoque, a former Republican state lawmaker who led the drive to end partisan local elections, called the Justice Department's decision "racial as well as partisan."
"On top of that, you have an unelected bureaucrat in Washington, D.C., overturning a valid election," he said. "That is un-American."
The decision, made by the same Justice official who ordered the dismissal of a voting rights case against members of the New Black Panther Party in Philadelphia, has irritated other locals as well. They bristle at federal interference in this city of nearly 23,000 people, two-thirds of whom are black.
In interviews in sleepy downtown Kinston - a place best known as a road sign on the way to the Carolina beaches - residents said partisan voting is largely unimportant because people are personally acquainted with their elected officials and are familiar with their views.
"To begin with, 'nonpartisan elections' is a misconceived and deceiving statement because even though no party affiliation shows up on a ballot form, candidates still adhere to certain ideologies and people understand that, and are going to identify with who they feel has their best interest at heart," said William Cooke, president of the Kinston/Lenoir County branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.
Mr. Cooke said his group does not take a position on this issue and would not disclose his personal stance, but expressed skepticism about the Justice Department's involvement.
It should be noted that Kinston is one of the cities that requires monitoring under the 1965 voting rights Act for having a history of racial discrimination.
Even with that, this is stupid. The vast majority of voters wanted this, it is strictly a local issue, and the only people who stand to lose are those who need a party affiliation to get elected -- that is, people who cannot stand on their own merits.
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