Letter to the Editor - Kevin Corbin, NC House 120th Representative

September 13, 2019
Letter to the Editor,

The Governor’s veto of the budget was done on Wednesday and frankly I have never experienced more misinformation being spread about a situation. I would like to clarify facts regarding how and why I voted yes on the override of the budget.

First and foremost, we did not take the vote while Democrats were attending a 9/11 service. That was falsely reported by a Raleigh newspaper and picked up by all National Media before it could be corrected. Governor Cooper has since confirmed that he witnessed no NC Legislators at the service in question.
Additionally, reporter and columnist Colin Campbell reported that only one legislator was absent due to attending a service in their district. Reports of legislators being at services commerce the 18th anniversary of September 11 was totally false.

Secondly, the Speaker’s office has published an excellent piece giving the overall facts and dispels all the rumors of things that just didn’t happen. If you are interested in what happened, this will be a nice 10 minute read that will give you all the facts. http://speakermoore.com/facts-true-recap-n-c-house-overrode-budget-veto/

I stand by everything said here. All the post discussion is Monday morning quarterbacking when all info and opinions are in.

Here is my real time reality of how the vote occurred on Wednesday. I walked in to the Chamber at 8:30 a.m. sharp. We had no information that the veto override motion was going to be made. I am Deputy Majority Whip and I would have been one of the first notified. I was not. Remember, we are in real time now. After the opening prayer and pledge Rep. Saine made the motion to override the budget.

The Speaker asked the clerk to “open the vote.” As with all votes we are given 15 seconds to vote yes or no. Simple as that. I voted yes because I know the budget is great for my district. The truth is I had two months to make that decision. I was going to vote yes for the veto override whenever it came up. We did not vote on procedures, did not have time to think about who was on the floor and who was not, did not know Democrats thought there were no votes, we had 15 seconds to vote yes or no. I voted yes as I have planned since the veto came down to us.

I’m not crazy about the controversy or that the Democrats mistakenly thought there were no votes. The Speaker is the only one that can call for the vote. The announcement was made twice the night before that we would have votes. That is in the record and not debatable. The Democrats not being there was because their minority leader told them that there would “no votes.” He based that on a private conversation with the rules chair about whether two bills that were added to the calendar would be held from the 8:30 a.m. voting session so Dems could caucus before. The Rules chair said he agreed and the votes on those two bills would not be held at 8:30 a.m. I suppose he took it that there would be no votes. Again we knew none of this. All we knew was the override was on the floor with motion made.

Finally, we could vote yes or no. A no for me would’ve been a vote against my district, my schools, state employee raises in my district including teachers and law enforcement and State retirees. I voted yes on the budget, not on the procedure. I didn’t have that choice, nor did I know it was coming. I will always vote my district first and party or procedure last.

Kevin Corbin
Deputy Majority Whip


Published at 2:52pm on Friday, September13, 2019

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