Shame on Sheriff Howard for making a phony political issue out of the Governor’s executive order on immigration, sowing needless fear and anxiety in Erie County’s immigrant community, and acting once again as if as he has greater authority than the Governor, the Attorney General, the Legislature or the Courts.
Support it or oppose it, the Governor’s executive order instructing state agencies not to ask about an individual’s immigration status does not apply to municipal governments. It has no bearing on the Erie County Sheriff’s Office.
It is outrageous for Tim Howard to pretend that this is a matter that affects his responsibilities. I hope and pray that he does not use this phony issue as an excuse to begin intimidating residents of Erie County as they go about their daily business or to otherwise pursue extremist views on immigration.
We must work together to keep our community safe and prosperous. That means respecting the separation of powers among the branches of government and not going it alone or shooting from the hip. It means not engaging in the rhetoric of fear.
I will have more to say about the sheriff’s office and immigration policy in the coming days.
Calling the North Carolina Republican Party’s new congressional district map “surgical racism with surgical precision,” Bishop William J. Barber II of Repairers of the Breach was in Raleigh Thursday, announcing a lawsuit challenging the redistricting effort—pledging that the state’s voters will “challenge gerrymandering in the courts, in the streets, and at the ballot box.”
“This is a direct attack on the state’s Black Belt district and marginalized communities,” said Barber at a news conference announcing the legal challenge, a day after the state House of Representatives approved the new map in a party-line vote.
The new map, which was passed by the state Senate earlier this week and cannot be vetoed by Democratic Gov. Josh Stein under state law, will likely give the GOP an additional seat in the US House after the 2026 midterm elections.
President Donald Trump has called for mid-decade redistricting efforts by the GOP in states including Missouri and Texas, as well as North Carolina, with state Republicans heeding his demands.
North Carolina’s new map will likely give Republicans 11 of the state’s 14 districts by moving some Black voters out of the 1st District and into the 3rd District. Had the new map been in place in 2024, Trump would likely have won 55% of the vote in the new 1st District in 2024, up from the 51% he won.
Barber denounced the redistricting efforts across the country as “political robbery” by a party that wants “to rob people of their rights through this racially based gerrymandering... so that they can give power or keep power in the US Congress to engage in political violence,” including by cutting healthcare and blocking the passage of living wages.
“We’ve seen this pattern before—the use of redistricting and voting laws to divide, diminish, and deny,” said Barber. “But the truth is simple: When you steal people’s representation, you steal their healthcare, their wages, and their future. That’s why we will fight back... to make clear that in North Carolina, and across America, the people’s will cannot be gerrymandered out of existence.”
Barber said Republicans in the state Legislature are “gambling” to win another seat, instead of trying to win over voters.
“They’re saying, ‘Let’s move this county over here, let’s move this county over here,’ he said at the press conference. ”Black voters in Congressional District 1 make up approximately 40% of the population, and there’s a growing Latino population that makes up 7%... Black communities, Latino communities, and rural, working-class, poor white voters, if the districts are fair, have the power to build a fusion electorate that can overcome the greedy oligarchs’ will to control elections in our state.“
Along with filing a legal action against state lawmakers to challenge the legality of the map, Barber said Repairers of the Breach will hold a ”Mass Moral Fusion Meeting“ and public hearing on November 2.
”If they won’t hold public hearings, we will,“ said Barber. ”This is our Edmund Pettus Bridge moment... Black, white, and brown together—because our democracy is not for sale.“
the Governor’s executive order on immigration, sowing needless fear and anxiety in Erie County’s immigrant community, and acting once again as if as he has greater authority than the Governor, the Attorney General, the Legislature or the Courts.
