One of the most striking things about the unprecedented power grabbing currently underway at the General Assembly is the dishonesty of some of the people leading the offensive effort.
Case in point is House Rules Chair David Lewis, who as we reported this week, started the disaster relief session claiming that House leaders were being as “transparent as they can” when Lewis and other lawmakers had signed a letter two days before calling for another special session for all the power grabbing.
Lewis was simply not telling the truth—and he lied again Thursday defending the proposal to reduce the number of political jobs in state government that serve at the pleasure of the governor from 1,500 to 300.
Lewis and his Republicans colleagues increased the number of political jobs from 500 to 1,500 in 2013 after McCrory took office. Here is Lewis’ justification for reducing the number now, as reported by the News & Observer.
We have worked to modernize state government and the high number of exemptions, not used by the current governor, are being restored to a number and level that is consistent with the authority granted to past administrations,” said House Rules Chairman David Lewis, who sponsored the bill.
So slashing the number of political jobs is not a big deal according to Lewis, because McCrory hasn’t used the additional positions.
That is simply not true. The N&O again.
And McCrory has actually used much of his current appointment power, with about 1,400 positions currently designated as exempt from civil service protections.
Got that? Lewis defended his proposal to limit Governor Roy Cooper’s ability to hire his own people by intentionally misstating how many political hires McCrory made.
The offensive last minute special session to thwart the will of the voters is bad enough. Legislative leaders ought to at least have the guts to own up to what they are doing and why they are doing it—and stop lying about it.
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