Roy Cooper’s socialism blunder

From the unofficial start of the North Carolina Senate race last summer, former Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper has led in polling against former RNC Chairman Michael Whatley. That continued even after both formally won their respective parties’ nominations back in March.

Though one January outlier poll had Cooper up by 24 points, his polling lead average, according to RealClearPolling, is about 7.8 points, with the latest poll, from the Trafalgar Group, taken the second week in September, giving Cooper a 6-point advantage among likely voters.

Cooper has always been a tough nut to crack for North Carolina Republicans. He’s 69 years old and has served in government nearly 40 years, more than half his life. He first started in the state House and then went to the state Senate before serving 16 years as North Carolina’s attorney general. After that, it was eight years as governor.

Cooper’s track record of never having been defeated in an election led to the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee heavily recruiting him. It viewed him as a safe, reliable and known quantity in the Old North State, someone who has never been hit with a major personal scandal and whom a majority of voters have consistently shown they trust.

But Cooper has myriad flaws, which Whatley has been exploiting for nearly a year, on issues like crime, his handling of natural disasters like Hurricane Helene and his actions during the COVID-19 pandemic, to name a few.

Another area on which Whatley now has to attack Cooper is his opinion on the rise of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) in the Democratic Party, a question Cooper hasn’t been asked much by the North Carolina political press corps for some strange reason. This is despite the fact that DSA-aligned candidates for both the House and Senate have racked up primary victories across the country over the last several months.

In audio clips obtained by Fox News Digital, Cooper rejected the idea that he should sign the “Promise to America” pledge signed by a growing number of House Democrats that affirms that they wholeheartedly reject socialism and love America.

Cooper explained he didn’t want to add his name because he felt the party should be more accommodating of DSA members.

“I think the party needs a wide spectrum, particularly at a time when the Republican Party is shrinking and having all kinds of loyalty tests,” Cooper said, according to the Fox News reports. “I think we need to have all kinds of folks to be a part of our party.”

A “wide spectrum” that includes radicals who want to abolish the Senate, the Supreme Court, the presidency, our borders and whose admitted goal is ultimately to implement communism?

Whatley blasted Cooper for his answer, writing on X, “After emptying prisons, forcing men into girls’ sports, and turning North Carolina into a sanctuary for criminal illegals, he fits right in with the DSA.”

Oh, but no worries. Cooper’s campaign says he’s not a socialist. That may be true, but by not explicitly rejecting it, he leaves the door open to winning over socialist voters and their money to help get him elected.

The DSA platform is to destroy the country to save it. Any Democrat who refuses to condemn not only the DSA but also welcomes their members into the Democratic Party fold is not fit to serve as a dogcatcher, much less as a senator.

As he did during the 2016 H.B. 2 “bathroom bill” debate, when he threw North Carolina under the bus, Cooper has shown us who he really is. He’s not someone who is in this for the betterment of the state. He’s in it for the betterment of Roy Cooper.

North Carolina native Stacey Matthews has also written under the pseudonym Sister Toldjah and is a media analyst and regular contributor to RedState and Legal Insurrection.