Cooper evacuated during 2020 riots, a budget deal, & a mad mom
Plus: Property tax limits, Cooper's prisoner release list still in the headlines, Warren backs Cooper, polling and more.
Welcome back to the Old North State Update. This is edition #20 for 2026.
The Big Story
When rioters destroyed Raleigh, Cooper evacuated
On Tuesday, I dropped an article that was five months in the making on where former Gov. Roy Cooper was during the 2020 George Floyd riots.
The broad strokes: Cooper and his family were evacuated from the executive mansion and taken outside the city while citizens and business were subject to rioters who took over Raleigh, setting fires and destroying property.
The Cooper campaign did not respond to my request for comment and additional questions.
Read the whole article at North State Journal: Former law enforcement reveal Cooper evacuated during May 2020 rioting
Listen to my interview about this story with WBT’s Brett Jensen here.
Related Coverage: Election 2026: Cooper’s crime albatross swells
Updates on “It’s the economy, stupid.”
Last week, jobs numbers were very good for the Trump administration. So was the average tax refund, up 11.3% over the previous year, due in large part to Trump’s Working Family Tax cuts. Trump is now eyeing deals with Venezuela for oil, which will help address rising gas prices due to the war with Iran.
RNC spending “seven figures” in key states
Per NOTUS, the RNC sent 34 staffers into 17 states. The initial spend is “seven figures,” an RNC official told NOTUS. The RNC did not provide its full list of target states, but it will be in battlegrounds including North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Georgia, as well as “places that we don’t traditionally play,” such as Alaska and Maine, the official said. The party is planning to send more staffers in mid-May.
General Assembly
Budget deal
A budget deal has finally been made between the House and Senate. At a joint press conference on Tuesday, House Speaker Destin Hall and Senate Leader Phil Berger said they had come to an agreement and a budget would be forthcoming.
Berger, who was defeated in the March primary, called it a “starting point,” and the budget includes alterations to the income tax reduction trigger schedules which had been holding up negotiations. The changes likely have to do with the House agreeing to advance the funding for the children’s hospital which has been a priority issue for Berger.
Pay raises, a central point of the budget, include an 8% average pay raise for teachers, bumping them to the top rate in the South. Teacher with more than 16 years experience will get a $1K bonus, and others with less experience a $500 bonus.
State employees will get an average 3% raise. Those employees will get bonuses of $1,750 for earners under $65K and $1K for those above. State retirees get a 2.5% bonus.
Law enforcement gets the lion’s share of raises:
SBI and ALE officers: average 20.3% raise including step increases
State Highway Patrol officers: 17.7%
Correctional officers: 15.4%
Probation/parole officers: 10.1%.Other state LEOs: 13%.
$40.1M is also set aside for one-time bonuses of $1,750 for local officers.
Fatmi tapped to replace Everitt
Wake Forest Commissioner Haseeb Fatmi was picked to replace Sen. Terence Everitt, who abruptly resigned last month. Fatmi was just elected to the Wake Forest role last fall and his rapid elevation to the legislature is marked by his “No Kings” activity.
Property tax limitations bill advances
H1089: Const. Amend. Property Tax Levy Limit. is moving forward.
The bill would put limits on local property tax levy increases and was sent to the House Rules Committee this week. It was filed by Rep. Brian Echevarria (R-Cabarrus), along with other primary sponsors.
Some of the other bills I am watching:
S394: Prohibit Foreign Ownership of NC Land. (Similar to H133: NC Farmland and Military Protection Act. filed last year)
CONGRESS
A mom is big mad at Rep. Virginia Foxx
Anyone who has paid attention to Foxx’s career knows she doesn’t mince words or pull her punches, even for kids, and this story illustrates that.
Foxx apparently responded harshly to a letter sent to her by an elementary school student who outlined the pros of electric vehicles and wanted the federal government to fork over $5,000 in tax rebates on EVs.
“Your request that ‘the federal government should give a $5,000 tax rebate for all new electric car purchases’ means that the federal government must take that money out of the pockets of hardworking people who may not have the means to buy an electric vehicle in the first place,” Foxx wrote back to the boy.
She also told him that he was being “indoctrinated.”
Well, the boy’s mom was mad that her son was told the truth and posted the letter on Instagram.
U.S. SENATE
Cooper’s prisoner release list: violent reoffenders
Roy Cooper’s secret prisoner release list is still circulating in various articles, like this one on Monday from Fox News: Former Dem gov in hot seat for ‘complete failure’ in ‘INSANE’ early release of thousands of inmates
Now that the list is out, analysis is showing the violent criminals included in the list and a large number of those released have gone on to reoffend.
Related to the prisoner list, the Republican National Senatorial Committee dropped an ad for Police Week hitting Cooper for “soft on crime” policies.
“Roy Cooper agreed to release at least 4,200 criminals from prison early, including Iryna Zarutska’s killer. Cooper is too weak to stand up to the radical left, and North Carolinians are still paying the price of his soft-on-crime agenda,” said NRSC Regional Press Secretary Nick Puglia.
Following the release of that ad, the Democrat Senate Majority PAC announced it was dropping $31M on tv reservation ads for Cooper.
But the soft-on-crime hits kept coming, with FOX News tying the murder of a Raleigh-area teacher to Cooper as well: North Carolina teacher’s killing reignites scrutiny of Roy Cooper’s criminal justice record in Senate race
Warren backs Cooper
Sen. Elizabeth Warren is dropping some of her $400K she’s raised on six senate campaigns, including Cooper’s. Scroll down this Punchbowl News update to “Warren spreads the wealth to state parties.”
POLLING
Real Clear Polling’s average this week has Cooper up over Whatley by 7.4, and that is including Carolina Journal’s recent polling results, showing Cooper up over Whatley by 11 points.
Another Poll
The National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) dropped its first polling for NC’s first congressional district of the 2026 cycle late last week. The poll was of 840 likely voters conducted between April 25-29 with a 3.37% margin of error.
The takeaways included in the NRCC press release include incumbent Democrat Don Davis having “exceptionally” low name-ID at 48% to Buckhout’s 42%.
The results also found the GOP ahead on the generic ballot 46% to 42%, and the Democratic Party’s image being “18 points underwater” with a 54% unfavorable rating versus the GOP’s 36%. See this data here and a broader set of results that include other states here.
Not in the press release takeaways: Davis and Buckout are polling in a dead heat at 41% each with 17% undecided.
Other Polling: AI Data Center Propaganda War
Gallup says 7 in 10 Americans Oppose AI Data Centers in Their Area
Washington Free Beacon reported last month that China, Iran and Russia have been blanketing the U.S. with anti-AI Data Center propaganda.
Whoever wins the AI race will dominate the globe for the next 100 years.
WHAT I AM READING
Former SPLC Staffer Spills the Beans on Union-Busting, Israel, Racial Discrimination Claims
Biden FBI secretly set up Trump to be indicted after he leaves office, Arctic Frost memos suggest
The same dark money groups keep turning up in redistricting fights
Parting note: No King, Cease Fire Now, No War with Iran… are all linked
All of the socialist and communist groups involved in anti-Trump protests that More To The Story has reported on over the past year have also all been linked to anti-Israel/pro-Hamas protests and to support by the Chinese Communist Party, according to a fairly detailed FOX news report.
Among the names dropped in the article is Neville Singham, the Communist billionaire married to a Code Pink co-founder who was investigated by Congress as being the multi-million funding source behind a large number of the groups behind the "No Kings" protests, as well as protests against the war with Iran.