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Elections board appointee seeks to intervene in Cooper’s lawsuit
Publisher's Note: This post appears here courtesy of the Carolina Journal. The author of this post is CJ Staff.
A former Lincoln County commissioner appointed to North Carolina's new eight-member State Board of Elections is trying to intervene in Gov. Roy Cooper's lawsuit against the board.
Martin Oakes filed a motion Wednesday in Wake County Superior Court to take part in the lawsuit dubbed Cooper v. Berger. Oakes, a Republican, labels himself on X/Twitter as a "Lincoln County political activist."
The governor is challenging Senate Bill 749, which would replace the state's current five-member elections board with an eight-member board. While the governor's political party maintains a 3-2 majority on the current board, the new board established under SB 749 would have four members from both major political parties.
SB 749 also would change the nature of state elections board appointments. Under the current system, the governor appoints board members based on recommendations submitted by the leaders of the state Democratic and Republican parties. The new law shifts the appointment power to Republican and Democratic leaders in the General Assembly.
A three-judge Superior Court panel granted Cooper an injunction on Nov. 30 blocking the new board from taking effect on Jan. 1. Judges suggested a trial in the case could take place in January or February.
Under Senate Bill 761, approved on Oct. 25, Oakes was scheduled to join the new state elections board in January. He "claims damages" if Cooper wins the lawsuit, since his appointment would be vacated "by virtue of reducing the number of seats on that board and removing appointment power" from state lawmakers and returning it to Cooper, according to the court filing.
A win for Cooper "would effectively remove" Oakes from the elections board, his intervention motion argued.
Oakes targets Cooper's arguments against the new eight-member elections board. He focuses on the board's "quasi-judicial" role in overseeing North Carolina's elections.
"Clearly 'quasi-judicial' powers are best served by a system in which a majority of the judges are not members of one political party, which creates the appearance, or the actuality, that decisions made are in favor of that political party, and against other political parties," Oakes wrote. "And no one disputes that the State Board of Elections is 'an independent agency.' How can the 'Governor's constitutionally assigned executive branch duty of election law enforcement' (Plaintiff's words) be reconciled with Elections being run by an independent agency?"
"There is also no specific wording in the Constitution which specifies that the Governor shall enforce election laws," Oakes added. "Plaintiff stretches the words 'faithfully execute the laws' to include election administration AND election judicial actions."
Oakes disputes Cooper's argument that appointments give the governor power over the board. The governor selects the current five board members from two lists of four names provided by the state Democratic and Republican Party chairs.
"The Governor's sole (minimal) ability is to reject one of the persons submitted by one party chair, and to reject two of the persons submitted by the other," Oakes argued. "The persons submitted by the party chairs may have extreme views (in any direction) but the Governor SHALL appoint those remaining after he has eliminated three of the eight."
"Consequently, one party chair has effectively appointed the majority of the State Board, since the Governor SHALL 'appoint' three people from that party chair's list," Oakes added.
"[N]either political parties nor the chairs thereof, are mentioned in the North Carolina Constitution, and should not be granted such extraordinary powers as to effectively control the State Board of Elections," Oakes argued. "The political party chairs have NOT been elected by the people."
Cooper "has not objected to this, but, in fact, asks that it be re-instated, as is," Oakes wrote. "This argument by Plaintiff also totally ignores the rights of the people under the 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution (equal protection under the laws). To have the state's elections run by members of one party, to the exclusion of the other parties and of unaffiliated voters, generates at least the appearance, if not the reality, of preferential treatment of the Governor's party's candidates."
The new elections board law "corrects this error by returning appointment power to entities (the majority AND minority leaders of the Senate and House of Representatives) which HAVE been elected by the people, and removes any constraint on who to appoint, and this includes potentially appointing unaffiliated voters," Oakes wrote.
The three-judge panel overseeing the Cooper v. Berger elections board case has not scheduled its next action in the case.
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A former Lincoln County commissioner appointed to North Carolina's new eight-member State Board of Elections is trying to intervene in Gov. Roy Cooper's lawsuit against the board.
Martin Oakes filed a motion Wednesday in Wake County Superior Court to take part in the lawsuit dubbed Cooper v. Berger. Oakes, a Republican, labels himself on X/Twitter as a "Lincoln County political activist."
The governor is challenging Senate Bill 749, which would replace the state's current five-member elections board with an eight-member board. While the governor's political party maintains a 3-2 majority on the current board, the new board established under SB 749 would have four members from both major political parties.
SB 749 also would change the nature of state elections board appointments. Under the current system, the governor appoints board members based on recommendations submitted by the leaders of the state Democratic and Republican parties. The new law shifts the appointment power to Republican and Democratic leaders in the General Assembly.
A three-judge Superior Court panel granted Cooper an injunction on Nov. 30 blocking the new board from taking effect on Jan. 1. Judges suggested a trial in the case could take place in January or February.
Under Senate Bill 761, approved on Oct. 25, Oakes was scheduled to join the new state elections board in January. He "claims damages" if Cooper wins the lawsuit, since his appointment would be vacated "by virtue of reducing the number of seats on that board and removing appointment power" from state lawmakers and returning it to Cooper, according to the court filing.
A win for Cooper "would effectively remove" Oakes from the elections board, his intervention motion argued.
Oakes targets Cooper's arguments against the new eight-member elections board. He focuses on the board's "quasi-judicial" role in overseeing North Carolina's elections.
"Clearly 'quasi-judicial' powers are best served by a system in which a majority of the judges are not members of one political party, which creates the appearance, or the actuality, that decisions made are in favor of that political party, and against other political parties," Oakes wrote. "And no one disputes that the State Board of Elections is 'an independent agency.' How can the 'Governor's constitutionally assigned executive branch duty of election law enforcement' (Plaintiff's words) be reconciled with Elections being run by an independent agency?"
"There is also no specific wording in the Constitution which specifies that the Governor shall enforce election laws," Oakes added. "Plaintiff stretches the words 'faithfully execute the laws' to include election administration AND election judicial actions."
Oakes disputes Cooper's argument that appointments give the governor power over the board. The governor selects the current five board members from two lists of four names provided by the state Democratic and Republican Party chairs.
"The Governor's sole (minimal) ability is to reject one of the persons submitted by one party chair, and to reject two of the persons submitted by the other," Oakes argued. "The persons submitted by the party chairs may have extreme views (in any direction) but the Governor SHALL appoint those remaining after he has eliminated three of the eight."
"Consequently, one party chair has effectively appointed the majority of the State Board, since the Governor SHALL 'appoint' three people from that party chair's list," Oakes added.
"[N]either political parties nor the chairs thereof, are mentioned in the North Carolina Constitution, and should not be granted such extraordinary powers as to effectively control the State Board of Elections," Oakes argued. "The political party chairs have NOT been elected by the people."
Cooper "has not objected to this, but, in fact, asks that it be re-instated, as is," Oakes wrote. "This argument by Plaintiff also totally ignores the rights of the people under the 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution (equal protection under the laws). To have the state's elections run by members of one party, to the exclusion of the other parties and of unaffiliated voters, generates at least the appearance, if not the reality, of preferential treatment of the Governor's party's candidates."
The new elections board law "corrects this error by returning appointment power to entities (the majority AND minority leaders of the Senate and House of Representatives) which HAVE been elected by the people, and removes any constraint on who to appoint, and this includes potentially appointing unaffiliated voters," Oakes wrote.
The three-judge panel overseeing the Cooper v. Berger elections board case has not scheduled its next action in the case.
Comments
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Who tore down our election system in 2020 with a multitude of lawsuits in states all over the country to gut our election integrity laws to make it easier to cheat? Democrat shyster Marc Elias who was working for Biden. President Trump called Elias out on what he was doing well before the election, but Elias' rigged system gave us a rigged result. Elias ought to be jailed for the rest of his life for election interference.
Former President Jimmy Carter in a federal commission he headed some years earlier had identified mail-in ballots as the weakness in the system that was most prone to fraud, and that is exactly what shyster Elias pushed. Elias and the Democrats wanted to make America safe for election fraud. |
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MAGA - Make America Great Again - sure beats your slogan of "I'm here with Stupid."
Over 74,000,000 Americans voted for Mr. Trump, and these were real votes, unlike many of those manufactured for the Idiot President. Keep parroting the The Idiot Biden's babble, and see just how far that works in these parts where real people come together. Big Bob: You project "the Overthrow of the Government" commentary just as constantly now as you project your racist obsession, which does approach full frontal bigotry. Keep up the empty rhetoric Big Bob because you are proving to be a valuable resource for the purposeful argument of patriots. |
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The MAGA way: If the court rules against you, you can advocate the over throw of the government as remediation. This is the exact reason these folks cant govern and shouldn't be in power.
If they win - no problem If they lose - tear down the system Do you really think this will end well? |
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Authoritarian Cooper is a grand proponent of Election Interference, as most members of the Non Patriot Left certainly are, so his battle will be an uphill one as someone who is absolutely NO Constitutional scholar, and never has been.
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The next invaluable initiative for Democratic Socialist election stealers' contrived collusion of nefarious purpose was to weaponize the justice system of corrupt Democratic Socialists; similarly, the suppression of news and information by corrupt Big Tech, and the Corrupt Corporate Media was beyond anyone's perceived possibility of absolute mendacity by the Non Patriot Left, many of whom now ARE former journalists.
What we know now is that the worst of Democratic Socialists /Non patriot Leftists hate the United States Constitution, and especially the First Amendment. That is irrefutable.