NC Politics

A three-judge state panel overturned North Carolina's 2018 photo ID law on Friday. In a 2-1 decision, the judges said the law makes it harder for Black people to vote. Republicans will appeal.

A flap over North Carolina absentee ballots in the 2020 election has resurfaced at the General Assembly as Republicans gave final approval to legislation limiting Democratic Attorney General Josh Stein’s ability to enter legal settlements. The bill is now heading to Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper’s desk following a party-line House vote on Wednesday.

North Carolina is getting a 14th congressional seat. The public can weigh in on how the new map should be drawn. People can also discuss the map-making process for new state House and Senate districts.

A bipartisan police reform package has been signed into law by North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper. Backers of the legislation signed Thursday say it will rid departments of derelict officers and give mental health assistance to others on the force.

North Carolina House Republicans have given final legislative approval to a bill to limit how teachers can discuss certain racial concepts inside the classroom. The proposal would prohibit teachers from compelling students to personally adopt any ideas from a list of 13 beliefs. The measure approved Wednesday will now make its way to Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper.

U.S. Census Bureau data tells us that rural counties in North Carolina lost population between 2010 and 2020. That coincides with the GOP's takeover of the NC General Assembly in 2011. But when a recent opinion piece said that Republicans have made life worse for rural NC counties, Steve Harrison, in his weekly Inside Politics newsletter, wonders if that's true — or a misunderstanding of causation and correlation.

A bill legalizing marijuana for medical use in North Carolina cleared two more legislative hurdles this week in the Senate. The Senate Health Care Committee voted for the measure on Thursday, two days after the judiciary committee approved an updated version compared to what it recommended earlier this summer. The measure could be on the Senate floor next week.

North Carolina’s minimum age to be married is now higher after Gov. Roy Cooper signed a bill increasing it from 14 years old to 16. The increase takes effect immediately after the governor's bill signing Thursday.

Adjustments to K-12 school policies on face masks and teen driving and CPR requirements due to the coronavirus pandemic has received final approval by the North Carolina legislature. The bill says each public school unit must vote at least monthly on whether to modify its face mask policy.

A key subject in a North Carolina ballot fraud investigation was supposed to be sentenced on largely unrelated federal crimes, but that got delayed because he was hospitalized. An attorney for Leslie McCrae Dowless Jr. told WRAL-TV he was flown from one southeastern North Carolina hospital to another on Wednesday, hours before his scheduled sentencing hearing in Raleigh.