PRESS ADVISORY PRESS CONFERENCE TODAY Democracy North Carolina is releasing new information about hundreds of voters who tried to vote in the May primary but were denied a chance to participate because of major changes in NC’s election law. The press conference includes the personal stories of a soldier, nurse, disabled senior, student, former felon, [...]
Art Pope, owner of the Roses and Maxway stores and Gov. Pat McCrory’s Budget Director, is the poster child of what one extremely wealthy individual can do to twist an entire state’s public policy in a racially divisive, ultra-conservative direction. Read more here. Pope literally depends on the black community to finance his political operation; [...]
Don Yelton, a member of the NC Republican Executive Committee, appeared last night on Comedy Central’s The Daily Show on a report exploring racism and NC’s new anti-voter Monster Law. The interview started as one would expect, with Mr. Yelton reciting a well-known line: “as a result of this law, the process is going to [...]
Art Pope is unhappy that a national campaign reform leader says he uses the Supreme Court’s Citizens United ruling and Super PACs to pump money from his stores into North Carolina politics. Pope is partly right: he doesn’t depend on the CU ruling or a PAC for targeting candidates with nasty ads; instead, he uses [...]
A federal grand jury has indicted state legislator Rep. Stephen LaRoque (R-Kinston) on a variety of charges related to misusing federal funds received by two nonprofit lending outfits he created "to alleviate poverty and increase economic activity and employment in rural communities." The charges follow an investigative series by NC Policy Watch and include stealing $300,000 from the federal government, failing [...]
This week has been a continuation of some of the work that we had envisioned ourselves doing in the beginning: ending corporate personhood, organizing in colleges, and increasing voter engagement. We had our first kick-off event for our “We the People” Truth Tour titled “The Art of Democracy”, an event at central plaza downtown. Along [...]
Click here to read part one. After an exhausting week of interviews, I found myself rising early Saturday morning to volunteer at the "Juneteenth" festival in Durham. Excited to have an opportunity to "Get Out the Vote," I set up my table four full hours before the festival started, hoping to catch people who were [...]
Hello all! My name is Erin Sweeney and I am a student intern doing a summer research project for Democracy North Carolina. I’m working out of Democracy NC’s headquarters in Durham. It may surprise some of you that Democracy NC does not have a fulltime organizer for the Triangle; the main office serves more as [...]
This past Saturday was the Juneteenth Celebration in Winston-Salem, a time in which community members celebrate the African American spirit and pay tribute to the roles and contributions which have enriched our society. It is a celebration that is the longest-running observance of the abolition of slavery, commemorating the day in which the last few [...]
A busy week thus far, here at Democracy Greenville/Durham! We’ve had a couple of eleven hour days this week, between phonebanking and a trek out east to Greenville and Rocky Mount. Monday’s phonebanking session went well; Killian’s friend Kimberley dropped by to give us a hand and we were able to make over 100 calls [...]