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.
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…?
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.