The Chickens Have Come Home To Roost For Cooper On HB2

Facts, Roy Cooper
Dear Gov. Roy Cooper: Just the facts, please.

It finally happened.

HB2, commonly known as the “bathroom bill” around these parts, was repealed Thursday afternoon after a year of manufactured outrage brought on by hysterical leftists who were hell-bent on using a wedge issue to boost then-attorney general Roy Cooper’s chances of winning the gubernatorial election.

It worked.

The Human Rights Campaign, Equality NC, and other radical leftist groups paved the way for Cooper’s win in the fall election, and with that came an expected – demanded – payback for their efforts. Nothing short of “full” repeal would do.

Cooper, as the Governor-Elect, had the chance for a full repeal in December, just weeks after the election. He torpedoed it. He claimed at the time it’s because he and fellow party members believed the “moratorium” on new NDOs proposed by Republicans was unacceptable. In the Senate, at least, we know that to be untrue – according to a Democrat Senator:

There were three other times compromise/repeal efforts went nowhere in 2016, and the reason why is simple: Cooper didn’t want the issue to be resolved before the election. It was benefiting him – and his extremist supporters – politically and financially to work behind the scenes to try and sabotage a state economy that, under the leadership of Gov. McCrory and NCGA Republicans, began to boom.

And when he wasn’t giving orders to Democrats in the NC house and senate to back away from any attempts at compromise or repeal, others did it on his behalf.

But the same issue that helped propel him into office is not going to go away so easily for him, in spite of his best efforts Thursday to spin the repeal into a victory for the LGBT movement. From an Equality NC email Thursday night:

Unfortunately, today, lawmakers in Raleigh passed HB142, a bill that was sold as a repeal by Governor Cooper, Phil Berger and Tim Moore. Just a few hours ago, Governor Cooper signed that bill into law.

We are deeply disappointed and opposed to HB142. Similar to HB2, LGBTQ stakeholders were not included in the discussions that led to this bad compromise. We cannot talk about protecting the LGBTQ community with no LGBTQ people at the table.

Watching Cooper’s press conference in which he announced he had signed HB142 – and reading the Code Red outrage from his apoplectic supporters in the aftermath – made you almost feel sorry for him. Almost. But considering the self-serving, underhanded political maneuvering he engaged in last year on the backs of the people of this state on HB2, he’s not someone for which a single tear should be shed.

Cooper made his own bed on this issue. Now he has to lie in it. Couldn’t have happened to a more deserving guy.