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Monday, December 5, 2016

PAT MCCRORY CONCEDES TO ROY COOPER AFTER HB2 BACKLASH & BACKPEDALING








PAT MCCRORY CONCEDES TO ROY COOPER AFTER HB2 BACKLASH & BACKPEDALING:

MCCRORY DIDN'T LOSE DUE TO PASSAGE OF HB2. IT WAS HIS BACKPEDALING.


Sources: CBS News, Wall Street Journal, YouTube


***** Pat McCrory Concedes North Carolina Governor’s Race to Roy Cooper:

The Republican incumbent had protested the result, but his opponent’s vote lead grew.

RALEIGH, N.C.—Republican Gov. Pat McCrory of North Carolina conceded his bid for re-election to Democrat Roy Cooper on Monday, ending a monthlong skirmish over the incumbent’s unsubstantiated claims of voting irregularity.

The governor’s race was extremely close, but the tally of absentee and provisional votes drove Mr. Cooper’s lead to more than 10,000 votes, up from about 5,000 votes out of 4.7 million cast in unofficial results on Election Day.

Mr. McCrory’s team had filed protests in dozens of counties, claiming that he was behind in the vote because of fraud.

But local boards of election, dominated by Republicans and appointed by Mr. McCrory, had found no widespread evidence of wrongdoing.

In a video statement, Mr. McCrory said “the majority of our citizens have spoken,” and he congratulated Mr. Cooper, the attorney general, and said he would work to ensure a smooth transition.

The gubernatorial race was an outlier in North Carolina, which elected President-elect Donald Trump, Sen. Richard Burr and other Republicans running statewide for treasurer and lieutenant governor.

But Mr. McCrory lost the state’s two biggest metropolitan areas of Charlotte and Raleigh, both of which he carried in 2012.

Many voters said they disapproved of Mr. McCrory’s championing of a law restricting public bathroom use by transgender people.

Mr. Cooper thanked Mr. McCrory for his service and called for unity after a “divisive election season.” In a statement, he said, “I know there is more that unites us than divides us.”

The governor-elect said his priorities would be investing in schools and supporting working families.

But the GOP still has veto-proof majorities in both houses of the legislature, and his allies say it is likely that he will spend much of his time seeking to block a legislative agenda rather than advance his own.

Mr. McCrory, who was first elected in 2012, had solicited supporters for funds to help pay for legal costs in challenging the results. His team’s allegations of fraud prompted Republicans to pledge to change election laws if necessary when the legislature reconvenes early next year.

Election law has been a contentious topic in North Carolina. Last summer, the Fourth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals struck down a voter ID law and other restrictions passed by the state in 2013, saying they disproportionately affected black voters.

The U.S. Supreme Court is considering a separate challenge to North Carolina’s congressional maps, as Democrats say Republicans inappropriately drew districts based on race.

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