Lt. Gov. Dan Forest said in a post on his Facebook page that he has notified Gov. Roy Cooper that he plans to sue Cooper for violating the Emergency Management Act.
The Facebook post states, “Today, I notified Governor Cooper that, as a member of the Council of State, I will be suing his administration for violating the Emergency Management Act. The Governor has repeatedly ignored the law, enacting mandates that selectively target the businesses and citizens of North Carolina without concurrence from a majority of the Council of State.
“Before I officially file my suit, the Governor is required by law to approve the use of independent legal counsel. State agencies in North Carolina are required to use the Attorney General’s office to file lawsuits or else get an exception from the Governor. As the Attorney General has been responsible for drafting the unlawful Executive Orders I’m challenging, I have decided the only path forward is with independent counsel.”
The letter to Cooper begins, “On March 17, 2020, you issued Executive Order No. 118, entitled ‘Limiting Operations of Restaurants and Bars and Broadening Unemployment Insurance Benefits in Response to COVID19.’ That executive order contained section 1, which limited the sale of food and beverages by restaurants to carry-out, drive-through, and delivery only. You had requested concurrence from the Council of State for section 1 of Executive Order No. 118, but as I am sure that you will recall, a majority of the members felt that a further discussion was needed, and therefore they did not concur in your request. Despite the Council of State’s objections, you proceeded to issue the order.”
The letter from Forest to Cooper continues in a similar fashion about Cooper not getting concurrence from the Council of State on the executive orders he issued on March 27, April 23 and May 5 and the June 24 order requiring everyone in the state to wear masks.
It also notes that the Emergency Management Act requires that Cooper “seek and receive concurrence from the Council of State prior to exercising the most expansive statewide emergency powers of the Governor.”
Forest also asks that Cooper waive the requirement that Forest use the Attorney General to represent him in this lawsuit and requests an answer by 4 p.m. on Thursday, June 25.
Based on what you saw with Ace Speedway and the NC courts chock full of Dems…good luck.
” the NC courts chock full of Dems”
You can shorten that by saying “the Peoples Democratic Courts”
Cream the Coop.
How long will it be before protesters realize they carry pictures of our greatest presidents in their pockets? Washington, Lincoln, Jackson, Grant on their US Currency. Let’s see them burn and destroy those.
No they don’t. Paper money is so 20th century for the Woke Autonomous Zone and the People’s Snowflake Army. They carry EBT and GreenDot Cards.
Is the Lieutenant Governor the only member of the Council of State with any spine? The reason I ask is that here we are, months AFTER enactment of orders that have crippled the state and threatened individual freedom. And the legality of Governor Cooper’s actions are only now being brought up? Why so late? Why not at the point in time when this began? Why did no other Council person mention this? Why no collective Council action to petition for proper procedure? Why no collective challenge from the Council? Why no approach to the state legislature? How did the Governor and the Attorney general turn mere words into the force of law without proper procedure and nobody really spoke up til now? By such inaction, the Council of State seems to have concurred by inaction, which sort of makes them complicit in enacting an illegal Executive Order. The problem here, then, I suggest, is worse than we thought.