Truth for our times: NC General Assembly, Gambling Debate and Marijuana Question | Eastern NC Now

by Rev. Mark Creech

ENCNow

NC General Assembly to Reconvene: What Can We Expect?

The North Carolina General Assembly will return to Raleigh for its short session on Tuesday, April 21, with the primary goal of addressing unfinished business from last year. While short sessions are typically more limited in scope, this one is shaping up to carry significant weight, given the proposals that could emerge along the way.

The Ongoing Budget Stalemate, Shifting Political Dynamics, Key Legislation and  Veto Overrides Pending among other things.

A Lesson North Carolina Cannot Afford to Miss

What the Gambling Debate Reveals About Power, Influence, and the Public Good
This editorial first appeared in the Greensboro News and Record.
You will find the link here: https://greensboro.com/opinion/column/article_a89b6d9d-859b-4b98-9122-bd1a98ffbfe5.html

Phil Berger might well be considered one of the finest legislative leaders North Carolina has ever known.

For years, he has provided steady, principled leadership in the State Senate. Under his watch, our state has seen meaningful reforms, stronger fiscal stewardship, and policies that have improved the quality of life for countless North Carolinians. Much could be said in his commendation, and it should be said. He has served this state with distinction.

Yet even good men are not immune to the distorting influence of bad industries.

The controversy surrounding casino expansion in 2023, which Berger championed, and the political fallout that followed, should give us pause – not because it proves corruption on Senator Berger’s part (it does not), but because it reveals something deeper:

The gambling industry has a corrosive effect on everything it touches.

The gambling industry has a corrosive effect on everything it touches.

 

 

 


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Comments

( April 21st, 2026 @ 9:11 pm )
 
Well, NO, Phil Berger is one of the WORST legislative leaders North Carolina has ever had, a corrupt pay-for-play political boss who constantly sold out to the special interests for campaign payola. He was a one man Tammany Hall. Getting rid of him was one of the finest outcomes in the recent primaries.

Berger did not start out that way. In the early years of the McCrory administration, Berger actually blocked some of McCrory's more liberal maneuvers. Then came the bathroom privacy bill, HB 2, which Berger initially supported and helped pass. Then when the special interests started whining about it, Berger flipped over to the dark side and led the effort to repeal it so biological men can now go into womens' restrooms. After that he stayed on the dark side for the campaign payola the special interests would shower on him. Berger became the driving force behind a whole host of liberal policies; the NC Green New Deal, the Obamacare Medicaid expansion, casinos, stopping key gun rights legislation, banning the NC shrimping industry, etc.. Who even needed Democrats when the special interests had Phil Berger doing their liberal dirty work for them.

Berger was a power bully, a pay-for-play functionary of the special interests, and a disgrace to the Republican Party.
( April 21st, 2026 @ 2:33 pm )
 
If they try to bring the casinos up in the short session, Keith Kidwell will still be there to help lead the fight against them as he did before. That will flip in the next legislative session because the casino lobby is one of the special interests which bought our 79th district seat for Darren Armstrong with $800,000 of special interest money. Armstrong owes them BIG TIME, The casino PACs were not the postcard boys. That was a different special interest. They were the TV advertising boys who put up all of those dishonest ads that grossly mispresented Kidwell's record on taxes. If the casino bill gets traction after December, local churches will need to work overtime to try to stop Armstrong from siding with those who bought his seat for him with their lying TV ads..



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