GOP Grabs 30 Governor Seats, Highest for Either Party in Over a Decade - ABC News

North Carolina elected its first Republican governor in more than two decades, securing 30 gubernatorial seats for the GOP.

Republican Pat McCrory, a former Charlotte mayor who had been leading in the polls in the final days leading up to the election, defeated Democratic candidate Walter Dalton, the state's lieutenant governor, with 55 percent to 43 percent of the vote, according to ABC News projections.

It was a major milestone for the Republican party. Not only was it the first time North Carolina had elected a Republican governor since 1988, it also gave the GOP 30 statehouse seats, the highest number for either party in 12 years. The Democrats now have 19 governor seats. One state, Rhode Island, has an independent governor.

Jennifer Duffy, a political analyst for Cook Political Report, a non-partisan election analyst group, said the significance of Republicans winning the majority of statehouse seats is that it gives them "bragging rights," especially after President Obama clinched his re-election.

"If Romney loses [today], one of their talking points will be governors," Duffy said. "If you have two-thirds of the nation's governors on the same policy and that share similarities, then you have something that has a combined larger effect... [Republicans] would argue they have all these governors implementing the same kinds of policy, that's only good for Republicans."

North Carolina's governor's race was a big target for the Republican party. Democratic Gov. Beverly Perdue, who narrowly beat McCrory in 2008, served one term but was not seeking re-election.

The Republican Governors Association spent nearly $6 million in advertising buys to support McCrory and link Dalton to Perdue after a grand jury indicted one of Perdue's top aides for allegedly scheming to pay a staff member off the books in violation of state election laws.

Duffy said state Democrats made a mistake putting up Dalton against McCrory.

"Beverly Perdue was so unpopular she couldn't run for a second term," Duffy said. "It's easy to tag [Dalton] with everything she did, so Democrats kind of gave up on that one two or three weeks ago."

ABC News projected that the GOP also celebrated a gubernatorial win in Indiana when Republican Mike Pence defeated Democrat John Gregg. The Indiana governor's race was expected to be a lock for Pence, a six-term congressman, in a state that is traditionally deep red. But Gregg, a former Indiana House speaker, held him off for a few hours after the polls closed. Gregg had gained some last minute traction after painting Pence as an extremist, similar to Indiana's Tea Party-backed Senate candidate Richard Mourdock, who created a controversy last month by saying pregnancy resulting from rape is something "God intended to happen."

Current Republican Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels is term-limited and not eligible for re-election.

The Democrats scored a big gubernatorial win tonight in New Hampshire, one of three statehouse races that were considered toss-ups in the final days leading up to the election.

Democratic candidate Maggie Hassan, a former state Senate majority leader who had kept a slight lead in a tight race over the past few days, beat Republican challenger Ovide Lamontagne, despite the Republican Governors Association dumping a reportedly $6 million advertising buy into Lamontagne's campaign over the weekend.

Current New Hampshire Gov. John Lynch, a Democrat who has been in office for eight years, is retiring after his term.

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Mississippi high court says some pardons by former governor valid

STARKVILLE, Mississippi (Reuters) - Ten pardons granted to prisoners by former Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour just before he left office are valid and should be carried out, a divided Mississippi Supreme Court ruled on Thursday.

Mississippi Attorney General Jim Hood had asked the court to void those pardons, among some 200 issued by the former Republican governor in January, on the grounds that technical procedures set out in the state constitution had not been met.

But the state Supreme Court ruled 6 to 3 that it could not set aside the contested pardons based solely on Hood's claim that the prisoners had failed to meet an obscure provision requiring felons seeking a pardon to publish the request in a newspaper 30 days in advance.

Hood, a Democrat, was not able to show that any of the pardons were invalid on their face, presiding Justice Jess H. Dickinson wrote in the majority opinion.

Like many states, Mississippi allows its governor to issue pardons with virtual impunity. Lawyers for the people pardoned had argued the court did not have the authority to overturn the pardons.

"At the outset, we wish to state that this case is not about whether the governor is above the law," Dickinson wrote. "He clearly is not..."

"We are compelled to hold that - in each of the cases before us - it fell to the governor alone to decide whether the Constitution's publication requirement was met," Dickinson said.

The 10 people who received the contested pardons were all prisoners at the time. Five had worked at the governor's mansion doing odd jobs, and four of those five inmates were serving life sentences for murder.

Half of the 10 remain behind bars due to a temporary restraining order that kept them imprisoned while Hood's challenge was under review.

The court vacated the restraining order on Thursday, but it was unclear when the prisoners would be released.

A spokeswoman for the state Department of Corrections said it must notify local law enforcement, prosecutors and any registered victims 48 hours before releasing the inmates.

The cases at issue in the legal challenge were not the only pardons by Barbour, a former Republican National Committee chairman, to spark controversy.

About two-thirds of the pardons were to whites and a third to blacks. Mississippi's prison population is roughly the reverse, two-thirds black and a third white.

One of the people pardoned was the brother of former National Football League quarterback Brett Favre. Earnest Scott Favre was convicted in 1996 of driving while intoxicated after a vehicle he was driving crashed and killed his best friend.

Favre was not in prison at the time of his pardon.

In a statement on Thursday, Barbour applauded the court's decision to uphold the governor's right to exercise not only clemency but also mercy.

"As I've stated from the beginning, I recognize and respect the natural feelings of victims and their families and I know this has been difficult for many of them," Barbour said.

"Nevertheless, these were decisions based on repentance, rehabilitation, and redemption, leading to forgiveness and the right defined and given by the state constitution to the governor to offer such people a second chance."

Hood said he would seek to change the constitution to require courts to enforce the 30-day notification policy in the future. He did not say whether he would challenge more of Barbour's pardons as he previously had indicated he would do.

"We do respect the decision of the Court, but feel deeply for how it must weigh on the victims and their families," Hood said in a statement on Thursday. "It is these victims and family members who have lost today and the criminals who have won."

The ruling shows the state's high court will not "police" other branches of government on procedural requirements, said Matthew Steffey, a constitutional law professor at Mississippi College who has followed the case.

"I believe the majority opinion is more faithful to constitutional history, precedent and theory," he said. "It's a principle of separation of powers."

(Writing by Colleen Jenkins; Editing by Greg McCune; Desking by Eric Walsh)

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Black Dem faces tough race for Miss. governor (AP)

By EMILY WAGSTER PETTUS, Associated Press Emily Wagster Pettus, Associated Press – Wed Aug 24, 8:05 pm ET

JACKSON, Miss. – After making history this week as the first black candidate to win a major-party nomination for Mississippi governor, Democrat Johnny DuPree now faces the tough reality of trying to win a general election against a better-known, better-funded GOP candidate in a strongly Republican state.

DuPree, the mayor of Mississippi's third-largest city, Hattiesburg, said he's not daunted because he has usually been outspent in campaigns. He said he plans to continue running a race-neutral campaign focused on jobs and education.

"We're in the race to try to make a difference for the citizens of Mississippi," the 57-year-old DuPree said after winning the Democratic primary runoff Tuesday night. "Our first priority is not the (campaign) finances."

An expert on black political participation said Wednesday that DuPree has little chance of defeating the Republican nominee, Lt. Gov. Phil Bryant, in the Nov. 8 general election.

"My guess is if the odds-makers were putting odds on this, it would probably be something like 100-to1," said David Bositis, senior political analyst for the Washington-based Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies. "Mississippi isn't ready to elect a black candidate to major statewide office."

Bositis, who has spent more than two decades researching voting trends, said Mississippi is one of several Deep South states that has developed re-segregated electoral patterns, "with the Republican Party being the white people's party and pretty much just African-Americans being the Democratic Party."

Mississippi's current governor, Republican Haley Barbour, is limited to two terms and couldn't seek re-election this year.

Republicans have held the Mississippi Governor's Mansion four of the past five terms, and the state has voted Republican in every presidential race since 1980.

With a population that's 37 percent black, Mississippi now has more black elected officials than any state in the nation, according to the joint center.

However, Mississippi hasn't had a black statewide official since Reconstruction. Decades ago, black citizens faced threats, violence and poll taxes for trying to exercise their right to vote. The political structure started to change and black voter participation began to increase after the federal civil rights and voting rights acts became law in the mid-1960s.

Marvin King, a political science professor at the University of Mississippi, said DuPree's win this week is significant.

"Even in Mississippi, you can have a statewide candidate who is black, who won a nomination, who earned his way to the top of a ticket," King said Wednesday.

Bryant, the one-term lieutenant governor, said that when he called DuPree to congratulate him Tuesday night, he noted the significance of a black candidate winning a major-party nomination for governor.

"I told him, there are children all across this state that look to him as an example now," Bryant, 56, of Brandon, said Wednesday. "I think it's a very historic moment. Now, we disagree on some issues and we'll have a debate about that."

Aaron Barksdale, a Mississippi voter who describes himself as a Libertarian, posted Wednesday night on DuPree's campaign page on Facebook: "Just remember: A vote BECAUSE he is Black is just as RACIST as voting AGAINST him because he's Black."

DuPree campaign manager Sam Hall posted a response that said "voting for or against someone because of their skin color is a ridiculous way to pick a candidate. That's why the only time we talk about race in this campaign is when the media asks about it or someone brings it up like this."

DuPree leads a city that is roughly half black, half white. He does not dwell on race as an issue in the governor's election, although he has acknowledged in interviews that it's a concern for some voters. He said the color he likes to discuss is green, as in money generated from job creation.

DuPree defeated Bill Luckett, a white Clarksdale attorney and developer, in the runoff.

Luckett immediately endorsed DuPree, saying the mayor has shown a desire to help all people in the state.

Independent Will Oatis of Silver Creek is also running for governor. Rival factions of the Reform Party want to put a candidate in the race.

Barksdale, 31, of Ocean Springs, told The Associated Press in a phone interview that he posted the Facebook comment because he got tired of people treating him as if he's racist because he didn't vote for Democrat Barack Obama in 2008, when Obama was elected the first black U.S. president.

"I have nothing against Johnny DuPree. He did a lot of good for Hattiesburg," Barksdale said. "But in 2008, it was the largest black voter turnout in history and it was all because Obama was there."

Barksdale said he voted for one of the Republicans who lost to Bryant in the Aug. 2 primary, and he doesn't yet know which candidate he'll support in November.

Two other high-profile black politicians ran for Mississippi governor as independents in the 1970s. Charles Evers, brother of slain civil-rights leader Medgar Evers, ran in 1971. State Sen. Henry Kirksey ran in 1975. Neither had to go through a primary.

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New York governor signs law approving gay marriage (Reuters)

ALBANY, New York (Reuters) – Governor Andrew Cuomo made same-sex marriages legal in New York on Friday, a key victory for gay rights ahead of the 2012 presidential and congressional elections.

New York will become the sixth and most populous U.S. state to allow gay marriage. State senators voted 33-29 on Friday evening to approve marriage equality legislation and Cuomo, a Democrat who had introduced the measure, signed it into law.

"This vote today will send a message across the country. This is the way to go, the time to do it is now, and it is achievable; it's no longer a dream or an aspiration. I think you're going to see a rapid evolution," Cuomo, who is in his first year of office, told a news conference.

"We reached a new level of social justice," he said.

Same-sex weddings can start taking place in New York in 30 days, though religious institutions and nonprofit groups with religious affiliations will not be compelled to officiate at such ceremonies. The legislation also gives gay couples the right to divorce.

"I have to define doing the right thing as treating all persons with equality and that equality includes within the definition of marriage," Republican Senator Stephen Saland said before the bill was passed. He was one of four Republicans to vote for the legislation.

Cheers erupted in the Senate gallery in the state capital Albany and among a crowd of several hundred people who gathered outside New York City's Stonewall Inn, where a police raid in 1969 sparked the modern gay rights movement.

"It's about time. I want to get married. I want the same rights as anyone else," Caroline Jaeger, 36, a student, who was outside the Stonewall Inn.

But New York's Catholic bishops said they were "deeply disappointed and troubled" by the passage of the bill.

"We always treat our homosexual brothers and sisters with respect, dignity and love. But we just as strongly affirm that marriage is the joining of one man and one woman," the state's Catholic Conference said in a statement.

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, an advocate for gay marriage who lobbied state lawmakers in recent weeks, said the vote was an "historic triumph for equality and freedom."

"Together, we have taken the next big step on our national journey toward a more perfect union," he said in a statement.

ELECTION ISSUE

President Barack Obama, who attended a fund-raiser in New York on Thursday for Gay Pride Week, has a nuanced stance on gay issues. Experts say he could risk alienating large portions of the electorate if he came out strongly in favor of such matters as gay marriage before the 2012 elections.

During the 2008 election, Obama picked up important support from Evangelicals, Catholics, Latinos and African-Americans, some of whom oppose gay marriage, which has become a contentious social issue being fought state-by-state.

In California a judge last year overturned a ban on gay marriage, but no weddings can take place while the decision is being appealed. It could set national policy if the case reaches the U.S. Supreme Court.

Connecticut, Iowa, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Vermont and the District of Columbia allow same-sex marriage, and Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois and New Jersey approved civil unions. The first legal same-sex marriages in the United States took place in Massachusetts in 2004.

But gay marriage is banned in 39 states.

In New York a recent Siena poll found 58 percent of New Yorkers support gay marriage, while nationally the U.S. public is nearly evenly split, with 45 percent in favor and 46 percent opposed, according to a Pew Research poll released last month.

New York City's marketing and tourism group NYC & Company said it was gearing up to turn the city into "the gay weddings destination." "The new legislation is good news for the City's $31 billion travel and tourism industry," said NYC & Company Chief Executive George Fertitta.

New York's Democrat-dominated Assembly voted 80-63 in favor of gay marriage last week and passed the amended legislation on Friday 82-47.

A key sticking point had been over an exemption that would allow religious officials to refuse to perform services or lend space for same-sex weddings. Most Republicans were concerned the legal protection was not strong enough, so legislative leaders worked with Cuomo to amend his original bill.

"God, not Albany, settled the definition of marriage a long time ago," said Senator Ruben Diaz Sr., a Pentecostal minister and the only Democrat to vote against the measure.

However, fears of a slew of litigation arising from a possible religious exemption to New York's proposed same-sex marriage law are not borne out by experience with similar laws in other states, legal experts say.

(Additional reporting by Phil Wahba, writing by Michelle Nichols, editing by Anthony Boadle and Philip Barbara)

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Illinois governor signs election law favoring Democrats (Reuters)

CHICAGO (Reuters) – Illinois Democratic Governor Pat Quinn signed into law on Friday a new congressional district map that could reverse gains Republicans made in the state in 2010 midterm elections.

Democrats were able to leverage their control of the General Assembly and a Democratic governor to approve a new election map for 2012 that analysts said could help Democrats win at least three more congressional seats in the state.

The effects of the law, which Republicans or third-party interest groups may challenge in court, would be to pit strong Republicans against each other, extend Chicago Democratic incumbent districts into suburban Republican districts, and incorporate new voter blocs into Republican strongholds.

Quinn denied that the redistricting was a partisan ploy by Democrats.

"This map is fair, maintains competitiveness within congressional districts, and protects the voting rights of minority communities," Quinn said.

Illinois Republican Party Chairman Pat Brady differed.

"This bill is a crass, partisan political move to silence the voices of Illinoisans, who last November made it very clear that they wanted to fire Nancy Pelosi by electing a majority Republican Congressional Delegation from the home state of President Obama," Brady said.

The Illinois Republican Party's lawyers will review the maps to see if any state or federal laws have been broken, said Jonathan Blessing, a party spokesman.

In the 2010 midterm elections, Republicans picked up 60 House seats nationally, knocking Democratic Speaker Nancy Pelosi from power and putting Republicans in charge of House committees. It was the biggest shift in power in the House since Democrats gained 75 House seats in 1948.

But Democratic analysts believe Illinois and California, where Democrats are still in power at the state level, are their best chances to gain back seats in 2012 through redistricting.

Republicans in power in most of the Midwest and South are drawing maps in those states seeking to protect new Republican members of Congress elected in 2010.

In Illinois, Republicans picked up four seats in 2010 to hold an overall edge of 11 to 8 in the state's congressional delegation. They also kept control of the wealthy North Shore suburban Chicago district vacated by Republican Mark Kirk's successful Senate bid.

Illinois will lose one of its 19 congressional seats due to slow population growth relative to other states, according to the federal census.

Andy Shaw, President of the Better Government Association, said the Illinois map was partisan politics as usual.

"Most of Quinn's adult life was spent in opposition to this blatant political manipulation of the system," Shaw told Reuters. "His willingness to sign the bill without any changes is another indication that he has had to abandon many of his progressive principles to be able to deal with the political realities of Springfield (the state capital)," he said.

(Editing by Greg McCune)

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Texas Governor Perry stokes White House run talk (AFP)

NEW ORLEANS (AFP) – Sounding every bit like a candidate for the White House, Republican Texas Governor Rick Perry thrilled party activists here Saturday as he ripped President Barack Obama's "arrogance and audacity."

Perry did not announce a presidential bid at the Republican Leadership Conference, but enthusiastically heaped rhetorical fuel on the flames of speculation that he will join the crowded field of Republican candidates.

"I stand before you today a disciplined, conservative Texan, a committed Republican and a proud American, united with you in the desire to restore our nation and revive the American dream," the governor told his cheering audience.

Perry cast his conservative faith in free markets, low taxes, and limited regulation as the antidote to what he portrayed as Obama's excessive belief in government solutions at a time of historically high unemployment.

"That mix of arrogance and audacity that guides the Obama administration is an affront to every freedom-loving American and a threat to every private sector job," he thundered to a cheering, rapturous crowd in a hotel ballroom.

Perry, who succeeded George W. Bush as governor of Texas, delighted the crowd by denouncing abortion rights and assailing Obama's landmark health law and bailouts of big banks in the wake of the 2008 economic meltdown.

And he blasted the president's handling of the economy, which he contrasted to Texas's first-in-the-nation job growth, and the swollen US national debt, which he compared to his state's balanced books.

"Americans voted for hope and got nothing but greater economic misery," he said, stressing "November 2012 is not very far away and we've got to be ready to elect Republican leaders up and down that ballot."

"Let's stop this American downward spiral!"

Polls show Perry far behind the Republican presidential frontrunner, former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, and some Republicans in Washington express skepticism that the Texan could get a campaign in gear quickly enough.

But a recent public opinion survey found Republicans split evenly at 45 percent on whether or not they are happy with their current White House options.

"I'm hoping that Rick Perry makes a bid," said Regina Wilson, a Louisiana resident. "He can be strong when he needs to be strong, I think he has good thoughts, and I think he has the strength we need."

"I think recently he's done a real good job with the state of Texas," said Ditch, 73.

"I was enthused about him, about the potential for him jumping in because I know he's a good friend of the governor's," referring to former Alaska governor Sarah Palin.

"So if she thinks he's a good guy, I think he's a good guy," said Ditch. "If she doesn't run."

Palin, who has not said whether she will run, was on the straw poll ballot that delegates were to use to indicate their preference for the best candidate to take on Obama.

Critics of Perry point out that his state has high rates of poverty, and he would likely face fire over telling an anti-tax "Tea Party" rally in April 2009 that Texas might be better off seceding from United States.

"We've got a great union. There's absolutely no reason to dissolve it," he said. "But if Washington continues to thumb their nose at the American people, you know, who knows what might come out of that."

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