North Carolina Miscellany

As a whole North Carolinians are unhappy with their Republican run state government. 38% of voters approve of the job it's doing to 52% who disapprove, including a 34/51 spread with independents.

Voter anger is being directed a lot more at the legislature than Governor Pat McCrory. McCrory's approval is steady at a +14 spread compared to a month ago, with 49% of voters approving of him to 35% who disapprove. Given that Bev Perdue's polls numbers slipped every single month from January to July of her term in office, stability is not a bad thing for McCrory. He's at 47/32 with independents.

The Republicans in the legislature though have just a 36% favorability rating with 50% of voters giving them poor marks. The Democrats aren't popular either at a 38/44 spread, but they're at least doing a good deal better than their GOP counterparts. Democrats currently lead the generic legislative ballot 47/41.

What's driving the Republicans' unpopularity? Much of the agenda they're pursuing is unpopular with the public at large:

-56% of voters disagree with the decision to block Medicaid expansion, compared to only 26% of voters who support it. Even rank and file Republicans are pretty divided on the decision (39/36 support) and there's majority opposition from Democrats (16/70) and independents (27/56).

-Voters are also opposed, by a 42/30 margin, to the elimination of the earned income tax credit. This is another issue where even GOP voters are pretty tepid on the action taken by their elected officials (38/34 support) and Democrats (26/46) and independents (28/45) are both pretty opposed.

-The action we see the strongest opposition to that Republican lawmakers are trying to take is the elimination of straight party ticket voting. Only 21% of voters support eliminating that option, compared to 68% who think it should continue to exist. Both Democrats (70/17) and Republicans (68/22) strongly support the continuation of straight party ticket voting.

-And finally voters oppose the proposed 'nipple bill' 41/36. Women are evenly divided on it at 38%, but men firmly oppose it 45/34.

Other notes from North Carolina:

-Voters continue to support stronger gun laws in general by a 53/38 margin, and an assault weapons ban specifically 50/41. Those numbers are pretty consistent with what we found in February as well.

-North Carolinians narrowly give Barack Obama poor marks, with 47% of voters approving of him to 50% who disapprove. They're evenly divided on Richard Burr at 37.

Full results here

Comments

[Sam Smith]

The idiots get what they voted for, there agenda was public knowledge

[Adam Cohen]

if your going to call anyone an idiot ( not that i disagree with you) you should make sure you dont make simple grammatical errors in your comment. Just saying...

Their - Possessive, "belonging to them"

There - A physical place, as in "It's over there"

[Karl]

LOL...... Yes you are correct you get what you vote for Look what we have ended up with in the last few election cycles.... Bev, Mike?...Yeah they did a really good job...what a joke.

[Sue]

I live in North Carolina, and we idiots did not get what we voted for, we got what Art Pope paid for. Pope has spent more than $40 million in the last 10 years pushing his far-right agenda on North Carolina and financing politicians who will carry it out. Though gerrymandering is usually thought of as a bi-partisan offense, the highly successful Republican State Leadership Committee's $30 million investment to take over state houses hit North Carolina especially hard. This was made all the easier by the massive amounts of Pope money focused on North Carolina. The governor he helped to put in office, Pat McCrory, rewarded him by appointing Pope to head the state's Office of Budget and Management.