Free Republic

A North Carolina county judge resigned on Monday because he did not want to violate his Christian faith and perform same-sex marriages, which are now permitted under the state's law. With the news that North Carolina's same-sex marriage ban was struck down by a federal judge on Oct. 10, Judge Gilbert Breedlove, a 57-year-old magistrate in Swain County and also an ordained minister, could not, in good faith, be forced to conduct same-sex courthouse weddings when his Christian belief tells him that a marriage is only between a man and a woman. "It was my only option," Breedlove told Citizen-Times....

North Carolina election officials discovered 145 names who are ineligible b/c they are illegal immigrants granted President Obama’s Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals status.....the State Bd of Elections discovered the illegal voters Tuesday when the DMV ran a search for DACA licenses. The DACA recipients on voting rolls will be sent letters requesting documentation that they are citizens. NC DACA beneficiaries are able to obtain drivers licenses, but are not able to vote. The Winston-Salem Journal notes that it is likely more ineligible people may still remain on the voting rolls. Nearly 10,000 names on the rolls are tagged by...

A debate in North Carolina that was supposed to feature incumbent Senator Kay Hagan and her Republican challenger state senator Thom Tillis ended up with Tillis sitting next to an empty chair because Hagan declined to participate. From Fox News: The program initially billed as a debate between Tillis and other candidates turned into a one-hour conversation with him and two reporters, as well as responses to emailed or recorded questions from the public. Hagan announced over the summer her decision not to participate, while Libertarian Sean Haugh didn't meet a 15 percent polling threshold to join Tillis. An empty...

Democratic Senate candidate Kay Hagan skipped tonight's debate in North Carolina "Facing new reports of corruption and insider deals, Kay Hagan skipped tonight’s North Carolina Senate debate, leaving an empty chair to represent her campaign. After the last debate, America Rising trackers caught Hagan skipping the post-debate press conference because of her inability to answer questions about missing Armed Services hearings on ISIS," claims America Rising. "This is not an image or video that conveys strength or confidence from Kay Hagan’s campaign 2 weeks out from Election Day."

Once is a coincidence, but twice is something else entirely. Less than 24-hours after the rapidly imploding Wendy Davis campaign in Texas warned that the interracially married Greg Abbott may just try to ban interracial marriage as governor, Sen. Kay Hagan (D-NC) supporters in North Carolina are also engaging in a bit of inelegant race-baiting. The North Carolina-based Fayetteville Observer reported on Monday that churchgoers in Cumberland County were appalled on Sunday when they were treated to an image of a Jim Crow-era lynching on a flyer warning of what may occur if Republicans take control of the Senate....

Dawn McNair said she was surprised Sunday when her daughter pointed out the background on a political flier urging people to get out and vote. The front of the flier blares: "Kay Hagan doesn't win! Obama's impeachment will begin! Vote in 2014." The words are superimposed over a grainy reproduction of a photograph of what appears to be a lynching. Someone tucked the flier under McNair's windshield wiper while her car was parked at her church, Kingdom Impact Global Ministries on Murchison Road. "My daughter said, 'Mom, look in the background. They're lynching somebody.' It's the lynching of an African-American...

With less than four weeks until Election Day, the National Republican Senatorial Committee’s independent expenditure arm is shifting resources to increase its investment in six states, including South Dakota and Georgia. The NRSC has moved $1 million to South Dakota, plus another $1.45 million to Georgia. In South Dakota, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee made a $1 million television ad buy this week, on the heels of tightening poll numbers that showed its candidate, Rick Weiland, gaining ground. In Georgia, a new poll suggests a runoff is likely. The NRSC also is upping its investment in four other states: Alaska,...

Campaigning for the Senate in 2012, former Harvard law professor cum left-wing populist Elizabeth Warren touched down in North Carolina and told voters, “The game is rigged.” She was more right than she knew. As it turns out, North Carolina’s Democratic senator was doing some of the rigging. Now, Kay Hagan’s political future may depend on how voters react to the story. Hagan’s vote for the 2009 stimulus, coupled with revelations that the legislation resulted in taxpayer funding for her family’s businesses, has emerged as an October surprise in a race hitherto marked by her unexpected resilience in a difficult...

Family and friends of Thomas Eric Duncan, the first and so far only person to die of Ebola in the U.S., gathered Saturday for an emotional memorial service in North Carolina. Mourners celebrated the 42-year-old's life at Rowan International Church in Salisbury, where his sister, mother and nephew worship, according to NBC affiliate WCNC. Duncan died in Dallas on Oct. 8, and had started showing symptoms of the virus on Sept. 24 after travelling to Texas from Liberia. He wasn't admitted to a Dallas hospital until Sept. 28 — two days after he first visited the hospital.

Not again! After being for a travel ban, then changing her position to say such restrictions would not work, Sen. Kay Hagan (D-NC) is back on board with a travel ban. “I am calling on the Administration to temporarily ban the travel of non-U.S. citizens from the affected countries in West Africa,” Hagan, who is running for reelection,

HICKORY, N.C. – Four tractor trailer trucks from the Centers for Disease Control triggered concerns Thursday that there was something related to Ebola going on in Hickory. A CDC Project Manager, Janis Eklund, said there was no Ebola scare. "Absolutely not," she said. Eklund said the trucks are used as part of a study concerning the health and nutritional status of people living in the greater Hickory area, but she understands why seeing CDC trucks in the city triggered immediate concern. "So, I'm hoping that once they hear that and know why we are really here, that will dispel their...

Richard Burr’s favorite judge legalized gay “marriage” in North Carolina around 5:30 PM on Friday. By Tuesday, the Administrative Office of the Courts — the state agency overseeing all those guys and gals in the black robes – had published the ground rules for this brave new era:

A company owned by the husband of Democratic senator Kay Hagan of North Carolina received taxpayer money for a green energy project through the federal stimulus of 2009, later revising down the project's estimated cost and keeping the difference. Don Carrington at the Carolina Journal, a publication of the conservative John Locke Foundation, has the scoop on how JDC Manufacturing, co-owned by Chip Hagan kept savings from a stimulus grant instead of returning the money to taxpayers: The company’s original application stated the total project would cost $438,627, and said JDC would contribute “leveraged funds” amounting to $187,983, or 43...

With Sen. Kay Hagan (D-NC) locked in a tight reelection bid and in need of a good Democratic turnout in a few short weeks, Democrats appear eager to promote the claim that North Carolina Republicans and their candidate for Senate are hostile to African Americans. Monday evening Hagan and MSNBC host Chris Matthews charged that the new North Carolina voting rules are intended to target African Americans, not because they are Democrats, but because they are African Americans. “African Americans think that they're being targeted because they're African Americans not because they're Democrats,” Matthews said on his MSNBC show. Hagan...

Last week, the Supreme Court declined to hear several Appeals Court cases on gay marriages, which resulted in bans on gay marriage being struck down in numerous states across the country. Following the Supreme Court's decision to punt on the issue of gay marriage, Meet the Press moderator Chuck Todd saw this as a sign that social conservatism was declining and obnoxiously asked "it is time for conservatives to surrender in the culture wars?" After playing a pre-packaged segment on the evolution of social conservatism in the United States, the NBC host did his best to portray social conservatives as...

A bipartisan group of senators from across the political spectrum—from Elizabeth Warren and Patrick J. Leahy to Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio—wants President Barack Obama to speak out and act to support Hong Kong’s democracy movement.They don’t specify exactly what they want Obama to do—they say “demonstrable, meaningful steps”—but note that a 1992 law “authorizes you to suspend trade and economic provisions should Beijing not provide sufficient autonomy for Hong Kong.”Leahy, the Vermont Democrat who is president pro tempore and Judiciary chairman, leads the letter with Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Miss., and Rubio.“The people of Hong Kong have sent a strong...

WILMINGTON — Democratic U.S. Sen. Kay Hagan and Republican Thom Tillis got personal as they sparred over national security Thursday night in the final debate of a race that could determine control of the Senate. Tillis was armed with new ammunition after Hagan acknowledged this week that she missed a Senate hearing on terrorism to attend a Manhattan fundraiser. In their third encounter, the two also returned to familiar themes, with Tillis seeking to link his opponent to President Barack Obama and Hagan blaming the House speaker for controversial state policies. The debate at Wilmington’s WECT-TV marked the first appearance...

A Supreme Court order legalizing same-sex marriage in five states reverberated further on Thursday, with the attorney general of West Virginia conceding that its ban on same-sex marriage was no longer defensible but South Carolina officials vowing to keep fighting to restrict marriage to a man and a woman. Since the Supreme Court decision on Monday and a ruling from a federal circuit court on Tuesday, new developments have appeared almost hourly as gay-rights advocates press for action in nine other states: Alaska, Arizona, Colorado, Kansas, Montana, North Carolina, South Carolina, West Virginia and Wyoming.

I’m not exactly sure what the reasoning is, here. It’s not because the race isn’t competitive. It is – or, more accurately, it could be. Jeanne Sheehan is ahead of Scott Brown by 6.5 points in the current RCP average, sure. But she’s also under 50% in the aggregate polling, which is the usual rule of thumb for an incumbent in trouble. This is the sort of situation where throwing some advertisting cash into the mix could really come in handy. Of course, it’s a little late for that now – back in May the Democrats blocked out about $1...

Latinos' furor with red-state Senate Dems escalated this week when the grassroots advocacy group Presente Action began running radio ads against Sen. Kay Hagan (D-N.C.), targeting her push against executive action on immigration. The Spanish-language ads will air for a week on two stations and tells listeners: "Senator Hagan voted with the most anti-immigrant senators in Congress in support of the continued deportations of our community." Hagan, locked in one of the most competitive Senate races this cycle, has for months publicly resisted Obama moving unilaterally on immigration and that has earned her the wrath of groups like Presente -...