As most of you know, North Carolinians are becoming increasingly fed up with the hard-right agenda pursued by Pat McCrory and his cronies in the state legislature. But this morning's Charlotte Observer has a story that should really make McCrory nervous. Voters in Charlotte, the city of which he was the longest-serving mayor ever, have turned on him. It may have cost his party a shot at regaining the mayor's chair--and that can only be described as an ominous sign in years to come. Last week, Republican city councilman Edwin Peacock narrowly lost the mayoral election to Democratic city councilman Patrick Cannon--and Peacock thinks McCrory cost him a shot at winning.
Peacock said McCrory, the Republican governor and former Charlotte mayor, often came up when he talked to voters – and usually, not in a positive way.
“What they would ask me is, ‘Are you going to be another Pat McCrory?’” Peacock said. “I do think it was a contributory factor. This was the anti- McCrory, anti-legislature sentiment.”
McCrory was a popular mayor re-elected seven times by big margins. But since being elected governor a year ago, his approval ratings have continued to fall.
If I'm McCrory and I'm reading this, I'm afraid. Very afraid. McCrory won the governorship mainly because swing voters in the I-85 Corridor (Charlotte, the Triad and the Triangle) thought he would be the same moderate, bipartisan guy who served as mayor of a city that was turning bluer by the minute. What they got was a guy who has veered so hard to the right that according to Nate Silver,
he's to the right of the likes of Sam Brownback, Rick Perry, Bobby Jindal, Jan Brewer, Rick Scott and Nikki Haley. Now that takes some effort.
The key to making McCrory a one-term governor in 2016, and possibly retaking the General Assembly in 2014, is to peel off the swing voters in the I-85 Corridor who put McCrory in the governor's mansion. And if voters in his own town are starting to sour on him already, that job may have just become a whole lot easier.