North Carolina’s new $30 billion state budget contains a provision that gives extraordinary investigative powers to a partisan oversight committee co-chaired by Senate Leader Phil Berger (R) and House Speaker Tim Moore (R). The Joint Legislative Committee on Government Operations — or Gov Ops for short — is empowered to seize “any document or system of record” from anyone who works in or with state and local government during its investigations. The rule applies to contractors, subcontractors, and any other non-state entity “receiving, directly and indirectly, public funds,” including charities and state universities.
    • dragonflyteaparty@lemmy.world
      27·
      9 months ago

      So those people don’t deserve full protections of the constitution, privacy laws, lawyers if their stuff gets searched, and should be arrested if they don’t comply…?

      • Cleverdawny@lemm.ee
        19·
        9 months ago

        For their place of business? No, that’s pretty clearly something they can set up within the terms of working for the state government or contracting for them.

    • bstix@feddit.dkEnglish
      10·
      9 months ago

      And how the "special oversight committee " only works for roughly half of the state government but can still cause people to be fired for not obliging to the Republican will?

      • Cleverdawny@lemm.ee
        113·
        9 months ago

        I hate to say it, man, but yeah, if you piss off the state government, and you work for them, they’re gonna fire you

        • bstix@feddit.dkEnglish
          10·
          9 months ago

          From the article:

          But unlike other types of government watchdog groups, GovOps is partisan. Republicans dominate the body, and the group’s politics greatly influence the types of investigations it carries out. For example, Gov Ops launched an inquiry into diversity training programs at the University of North Carolina earlier this year.

          Do you not understand how dangerous it is to democracy to have a partisan police force? If not then I uge you to read about the start of WW2.

          • Cleverdawny@lemm.ee
            113·
            9 months ago

            Every democracy has partisan oversight groups. I’ll get mad at their abuse, not their existence.

            • ghostdoggtv@lemmy.world
              41·
              9 months ago

              If you think republicans aren’t going to abuse a partisan police force then your concerns are void and you’re sleepwalking through life.

              • Cleverdawny@lemm.ee
                13·
                9 months ago

                I think it’s likely they will, and that every police force is partisan, and that they’ve been abusing that for decades.

            • Chaotic Entropy@feddit.uk
              3·
              9 months ago

              Do you just enjoy playing devil’s advocate?

              Nobody of sound mind could look at this and just think “Yep, this makes sense. One party should have a secret partisan police who can victimise other political parties and force them to stay silent about it, and comply without question, otherwise be criminally charged. This definitely won’t have any wider negative implications for society.”

            • bstix@feddit.dkEnglish
              31·
              9 months ago

              Every democracy has oversight groups, or an ombudsman. It’s not partisan

              Imagine a similar situation in a European country having several parties and one party wanting the state budget to fund their investigation of the government. That shit would never see the light of day because there’d always be a majority against it. This only exists in USA because of the two party politics.