#NCGA: Sen. Bingham doubles down, says NCGOP definitely gave him dirt to use on primary opponent
We’ve got quite a kerfluffle going down in one Davidson County legislative race. State Senator Stan Bingham is locked in a primary fight for renomination. The senator recently earned statewide publicity for distributing a flier detailing his opponent’s brushes with the law. Bingham let it slip to the media that NCGOP operatives made him aware of the information. A sternly worded but unsigned denial of Bingham’s allegation went up on NCGOP’s Facebook page.
But Bingham is still standing by his story:
[…] Bingham said he was made aware of the charges by the North Carolina Republican Party, which felt it was an issue that needed to be addressed. He also said he understands some people will not be happy about him distributing the flier.
“I didn’t look any of this up, it was brought to me from the GOP in Raleigh,” Bingham said. “They think it is important and wanted to do something about it. I don’t know if it will have a negative impact or not, but in an election you need to know as much as you can about the candidates.”
Amazing. We’ve been subjected to all kinds of lectures from Raleigh about not beating up on fellow Republicans. Save it for the Democrats in the general, we’re told. But all kinds of details are leaking out about party officials aiding incumbents in GOP primaries.
In addition to this, you’ve got an NCGOP staffer working as a campaign treasurer for one incumbent legislator fighting it out in a primary. The NCGOP executive director’s campaign consulting firm — which he helped found — is involved in at least one primary race involving an incumbent GOP legislator. We heard stories from last election cycle about Speaker Thom Tillis lining up primary opponents for his fellow Republicans. Now, we have our senior US senator and our Republican governor openly taking sides in a hotly-contested GOP primary for US Senate.
NRSC has been doing opposition research against conservative US Senate candidates, so it is not surprising that NCGOP is doing the same against conservatives in legislative races. Bihgham is one of the more liberal Republican state senators. NCGOP are such hypocrites. The state level needs a thorough housecleaning.
Legislators including Tillis and others are meddling in the House District 80 seat race which is basically an open seat. One donor who lives in Raleigh and is a retired “partner” at IBM wrote a check for $3000 to Younts who was appointed in a very controversial vote. Red Dome Group is also involved and have been since before Poole was employed at the NCGOP. The NCGOP motto should be “do as I say not as I do.”
Meddling from Raleigh in legislative races has been a huge problem under Tilli$, and is one of the reasons I would find it extremely difficult to vote for him if he were the nominee. I am keeping my fingers crossed that Tillis will be the David Dewhurst of North Carolina and we will take him down in the runoff.
How long you folks been around North Carolina politics?
Of course both the NCGOP and NC Democratic Party will tell you that they definitely do not get involved in primaries. Please! They have always done that and have always denied it. Do your really think that politicos who love politics are not going to get involved?
We all know that both parties do it and we all agree that they lie about it. That’s politics. What fun would it be if they told the truth? The fun is in slipping support to your favorite while pretending not to be doing it. That is the right of those in office.
Politics earned its dirty name. Let’s no go messing that up now!
I don’t care what the Democrats do. County Republican organizations need the same freedom to get involved as the party bosses in Raleigh.
Agreed; County Republican organizations need the same freedom of involvement as the Raleigh party bosses. I hope they understand that the only way they will have that freedom is to take it.