[JTN] Cooper disputes he was responsible for the release of the defendant when he was governor.
The release five years ago of an estimated 9,000 prisoners – known to include 3,500 as part of settling litigation led by the NAACP and ACLU against then-Gov. Roy Cooper – included DeCarlos Brown Jr., the leader of North Carolina's Senate.
Video of Brown in a stabbing death on a light rail train in Charlotte last year went viral and led to congressional pressure for the magistrate releasing him eight months earlier to be removed; new law ending cashless bail; and removal of the unwritten moratorium on the state’s death penalty.
Sen. Phil Berger, R-Rockingham, the president pro tempore of the chamber, is asking for more.
“As governor, Roy Cooper let thousands of criminals out early and hid his actions from the public,” said the 13th-term senator. “DeCarlos Brown Jr., who is now on trial for murder, was one of the prisoners. Cooper’s secret deal with far-left activists put violent criminals back on the streets. North Carolinians have a right to know the extent Cooper went to hide his soft-on-crime policies and who was released. Cooper’s policies continue to endanger neighborhoods across our state.”
The campaign for Cooper, a four-term attorney general, said the accusation is false and Brown was released earlier.
The release of 3,500 was on Feb. 25, 2021, during the COVID-19 pandemic. A list of prisoners released was never made public. Berger said Wednesday he has the list. Cooper had been sued by the North Carolina State Conference of the NAACP, Disability Rights North Carolina, the American Civil Liberties Union of North Carolina Legal Foundation, four prisoners and an inmate’s wife.
Before the settlement, the Department of Public Safety had already released 16% of the state’s population, dropping the total incarcerated to 28,680 – or a release of more than 5,400.
It said the plan was to release inmates who have not committed crimes against other people; are pregnant; are scheduled to be released in 2021; and planned to grant early release to those on track for parole.
Iryna Zarutska, 23, was killed while aboard the Lynx Blue Line light rail train about 10 p.m. Aug. 22 alongside Camden Road near the East/West station, according to the Charlotte Area Transit System video. Brown, arrested a 15th time in as many years, is charged with first-degree murder on the state level and charged on the federal level with committing an act causing death on a mass transportation system.
While in the local news immediately, the story went viral two weeks later when video was released by Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police from cameras aboard the train.
Six days later, Charlotte taxpayers spent a minimum of $3.4 million and possibly more for a Washington public relations firm’s aim of “enhancing the public’s perception and use of public transit in the Charlotte-Mecklenburg area.” Nine Democrats and two Republicans on the City Council delivered a unanimous vote to climax the Sept. 11 issuance of request for proposals.
Following the death of Zarutska, first-term Republican state Auditor Dave Boliek took a different route, opening an investigation into safety and spending at CATS.
His staff's preliminary audit found a 55% reduction in armed security staff, 211% increase in contract value, and ties to diversity, equity and inclusion in a damning analysis released Sept. 30.
Armed security personnel for CATS were between 68 and 88 in a 2018 contract with G4S Secure Solutions. September’s detail was 39.
PSS has the contract today. The pact was for $5.9 million in 2022 and $18.4 million in 2025 when Zarutska was killed.
When the audit was released, the contract allowed up to 219 personnel. That means 82.1% of the available jobs were vacant in an agreement allowing armed guards on all 48 train cars at once.
[JTN] The rule, dubbed Schedule Policy/Career, converts a wide range of federal policy-related employees into a status similar to that of political appointees who can be fired at will.
The Trump administration said Thursday that it has finalized a rule that creates a new government schedule that will make it easier for administrations to fire federal employees it views as hindering its agenda.
The rule, dubbed Schedule Policy/Career, converts a wide range of federal policy-related employees into a status similar to that of political appointees who can be fired at will.
The change is expected to impact up to 50,000 federal workers. Unions have opposed the change, arguing it politicizes the federal workforce, which previously was intended to be neutral and expertise-oriented, according to The Hill.
“This is not about people’s views or ideas," Office of Personnel Management Director Scott Kupor said. "This is about whether they are refusing to actually affect their duties on behalf of the American people consistent with the objectives of this administration.
“The only impact Policy/Career has is if their disagreement leads them to then try to actively thwart or undermine the execution of those priorities, then that [is] behavior that we want to declare to people is not acceptable," he added.
The new rule also changes how federal employees under the new designation can report waste, fraud, or abuse, by barring them from going to the Office of Special Counsel and forcing them to make their complaint of wrongdoing to their own agency.
[Breitbart] Rep. Mark Amodei, Nevada’s only GOP congressman, has become the thirtieth House Republican to announce that they will not seek reelection ahead of the upcoming midterms.
“Serving the people of Nevada has been the honor of my lifetime. Nobody is prouder of our Nevada Congressional District than me. Thank you for the honor. Every achievement worth doing began with listening to Nevadans and fighting for our values,” Amodei said in a statement posted to social media.
“I came to Congress to solve problems and to make sure our State and Nation have strong voice in the federal policy and oversight processes. I look forward to finishing my term. After 15 years of service, I believe it is the right time for Nevada and myself to pass the torch,” he added.
Amodei, a senior member of the House Appropriations Committee, recently made headlines for criticizing Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem’s response after Minneapolis anti-ICE protester Alex Pretti was fatally shot in a scuffle with federal agents.
“There’s people who have had it with Kristi Noem,” Amodei told the Nevada Independent after the January incident. “For an administration that’s had a lot of success on the border and immigration issues generally, in my view, this has put all that stuff into question, and whether that’s right or not, well, it is politics, and perception is reality. And right now, the perception is not outstanding.”
In the aftermath of the shooting, Noem repeated talking points pushed by White House aide Stephen Miller that described Pretti as a “domestic terrorist” who sought to inflict “maximum damage” on federal agents, Breitbart News reported.
Amodei characterized DHS’s reaction to Pretti’s killing as “reflexive defense” and disagreed with the accusation of “domestic terrorism.”
“Sending [White House border czar] Tom Homan to check in on one of Kristi Noem’s departments operating up there after the last few weeks is not a sign of confidence,” he told the outlet. “She didn’t do herself any favors when she called this guy a domestic terrorist.”
He went on to call President Donald Trump’s decision to send Homan to Minnesota “a step in the right direction,” and added, “If anybody thinks they’re going to ‘talking point’ their way out of this, they’re nuts.”
House Republicans declining to run for reelection are outpacing their Democrat counterparts so far, with the Hill reporting that 21 Democrat representatives have announced retirements or campaigns for higher office.
#3
Another guy who anticipates massive turmoil after the mid-terms and wants to avoid the forecast "Eternal Impeachment" drama and petty harassment that will ensue if the forecast is correct?
He has been my Congressman for the past 7 years and I can count his local media/mailing/forum outreach efforts on one hand.
It’s New Jersey. The question is not the margin of votes, but the margin of cheating. Quite possibly AIPAC was actually successful.
[IsraelTimes] Progressive US Sen. Bernie Sanders’ political director is holding onto a very thin lead in a special House Democratic primary race, indicating AIPAC’s strategy in it may have backfired.
Analilia Mejia is leading former congressman Tom Malinowski by 486 votes, amounting to less than a percentage point after 91% of the ballots have been counted.
The AIPAC-linked United Democracy Project spent significant funds to try and boost another candidate who finished in a distant third, while running attack ads against Malinowski — a former ally of the pro-Israel lobby who has become increasingly critical of the Israeli government’s policies toward the Palestinians.
Mejia’s was not favored to win, but may have benefited from the negative campaign against Malinowski.
Responding to the initial results, UDP says, “The outcome in NJ-11 was an anticipated possibility, and our focus remains on who will serve the next full term in Congress. UDP will be closely monitoring dozens of primary races, including the June NJ-11 primary, to help ensure pro-Israel candidates are elected to Congress.”
Mejia and Malinowski are competing to fill the New Jersey 11th District seat, which was vacated after Mikie Sherill was elected governor of the state.
All three counties in the district report some mail-in ballots yet to be processed. Also, mail-in ballots postmarked by election day can arrive as late as Wednesday and still be counted.
Malinowski did better than Mejia among the mail-in ballots already counted in all three counties, leaving the outcome of the race uncertain.
The Democratic winner will face Randolph Mayor Joe Hathaway, who was unopposed in the Republican primary, on April 16.
Malinowski served two terms in the House before losing a bid for reelection in a different district in 2022. He had the endorsement of New Jersey Democratic Sen. Andy Kim, who has built support among progressive groups.
Mejia, a former head of the Working Families Alliance in the state and political director for Sanders during his 2020 presidential run, had the Vermont independent senator’s endorsement as well as that of US Rep. Alexandria Ocasio Cortez of New York. She also worked in President Joe Biden’s Labor Department as deputy director of the women’s bureau.
The special primary and April general election will determine who serves the remainder of Sherrill’s term, which ends next January. There will be a regular primary in June and a general election in November for the next two-year term.
#1
In primary and special elections, centrists tend to stay home.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
02/07/2026 7:34 Comments ||
Top||
#2
A subsequent Israel Times article suggests AIPAC chose poorly, as it has become a contest between the two Democratic candidates to not support Israel. They should have looked at the Republican or stayed silent, as neither of the Dems fits the single criterion they claim as their purpose. Oh well: Lefties skinned another respected institution to wear as a coat. :-(
#3
Candace Owens blames Israel for 9/11 Candace Owens, one of the leading voices of the American right [???], claimed that the WTC hijackers were actually Israelis.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
