Pat McCory Archives

12 Jun, 2025

North Carolina’s New Tea Party Majority Puts Higher Education in the Crosshairs

February 5, 2013 Jon Ponder

With the election of Pat McCory as governor last November, Republicans have taken complete control of North Carolina’s government — they won majorities the legislature in the 2010 nationwide tea party landslide — for the first time since the GOP was the liberal party, during the post-Civil War Reconstruction era.

Predictably, however, the newly empowered Republicans in North Carolina have begun to do what their GOP colleagues in other states have done when voters put them in charge — they are overreaching.

McCrory caused a firestorm among Democrats and other fans of higher learning last week in an interview on a right-wing radio show hosted by George Bush Sr.’s drug czar, Bill Bennett, by attacking one of North Carolina’s most historic success stories — its public universities and community college system:

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Tag: Pat McCory

North Carolina’s New Tea Party Majority Puts Higher Education in the Crosshairs

Poetic Justice

Verbatim

“As is so often the case, Donald Trump’s opponents are playing into his hands. This is exactly the kind of fight that Donald Trump loves, with his opponents carrying Mexican flags past burning cars.”

— Republican pollster Whit Ayres, quoted by the Wall Street Journal.

“Don’t kid yourself they know they are absolutely getting cooked politically with their terrible bill and rising prices, and they want to create a violent spectacle to feed their content machine. It’s time for the mainstream media to describe this authoritarian madness accurately.”

— Sen. Brian Schatz (D-HI), reacting on X to President Trump sending National Guard troops to Los Angeles.

“The people have spoken. A new political party is needed in America to represent the 80% in the middle! And exactly 80% of people agree. This is fate.”

— Elon Musk floated a new political party on Friday after falling out with President Trump over the big, beautiful bill, The Hill reports. He followed up with a potential name for the group, “The America Party.”

“Donald Trump and Elon Musk’s alliance took off like one of SpaceX’s rockets. It was supercharged and soared high. And then it blew up.”

— Associated Press

“The BBB will increase by orders of magnitude the scope, scale and speed of removing illegal and criminal aliens from the United States. For that reason alone, it’s the most essential piece of legislation currently under consideration in the entire Western World, in generations.”

— Trump aide Stephen Miller, on X, defending the Republican budget bill after Elon Musk called it a “disgusting abomination.”

Numerati

53% to 27%

As the Senate debates the GOP tax and spending bill titled One Big Beautiful Bill Act and President Donald Trump pushes for a July 4 deadline to sign it, a new Quinnipiac poll finds voters overwhelmingly oppose the legislation, 53% to 27%, with 20% not offering an opinion.

47% to 34%

A new YouGov poll finds that President Trump’s deployment of Marines to Los Angeles is deeply unpopular, with a 47 percent disapproval mark, compared with 34 percent who approve. Dispatching the National Guard isn’t much better: 45 percent disapprove and 38 percent approve.

$134 million

After persistent questioning about the cost of sending National Guard members and Marines to Los Angeles in response to protests over immigration raids, Hegseth turned to his acting comptroller, Bryn Woollacott MacDonnell, who said it would cost $134 million, the Associated Press reports.

8

Eight states, including Florida and Tennessee, have introduced or passed legislation to ban planes from emitting “chemtrails” to poison Americans or control the weather, The Guardian reports. Of course, there’s no credible evidence that this is even happening.

70%

A new KFF Health poll finds that more than 70% of Americans are worried about the impact of Medicaid cuts in the bill leading to more people uninsured and hurting hospitals.