Cooper vetoes elections, judiciary bills

Gov. Roy Cooper vetoed two bills late Friday, one dealing with elections laws and the other one of two judicial redistricting efforts passed by the General Assembly.

Posted 2:08 a.m. Jun 16, 2018 — Updated 2:08 a.m. Jun 16, 2018

Matthew Burns

, WRAL.com senior producer/politics editor

RALEIGH, N.C. — Gov. Roy Cooper vetoed two bills late Friday, one dealing with elections laws and the other one of two judicial redistricting efforts passed by the General Assembly.

Senate Bill 486 deals with various elections issues, from requiring criminal background checks on state and county elections workers to setting parameters for vendors of electronic poll books to barring any candidate who lost a primary election from switching to a third party to run in the general election. One section of the law outlines how judicial races will be handled on the November ballot after lawmakers canceled primaries for those seats this year.

"Continued election meddling for partisan advantage weakens public confidence. Judges’ races should be free of partisan labels," Cooper said in a statement.

Lawmakers last year enacted legislation that judges would again run in partisan races after having nonpartisan judicial elections for more than a decade.

Senate Bill 757 redraws judicial districts in Wake and Mecklenburg counties, splitting Wake County into six districts in which District Court judges would run instead of running in a countywide election.

"The legislative attempts to rig the courts by reducing the people's vote hurts justice. Piecemeal attempts to target judges create unnecessary confusion and show contempt for North Carolina’s judiciary," Cooper said in a statement.

On Friday, lawmakers passed a second judicial redistricting bill that affects several counties across the state.

Republican lawmakers have veto-proof majorities in both the House and the Senate and are expected to hold override votes next week on both bills.

Cooper has now issued 16 vetoes since he took office at the beginning of 2017, and lawmakers have overridden 11 of them.

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