Cooper Dithers in Secret and Continues to Keep NC Families and Businesses in the Dark

June 24, 2020
For Immediate Release

Raleigh NC - Governor Roy Cooper will finally hold a press conference a mere 50 hours before his Phase 2 executive order expires. While Cooper dithers in his bunker, North Carolina businesses and families are left seeking very basic answers on when they can turn the lights back on in their businesses and schools. Cooper will not work with anyone outside of his control. He refuses to work with the business community and other elected leaders. 

Cooper's lack of leadership left North Carolina as one of only 12 states that did not have an increase in jobs in May. His economic policies responding to COVID continue to be an outlier. For example, 41 other states have formed economic recovery task forces, and 46 states have allowed gyms to reopen. Yet, North Carolina ranks 27th in COVID cases per capita. North Carolina has a median caseload, but Cooper's lockdown is one of the strictest in the country. 

"Governor Cooper's decision to wait until the very last minute to announce his reopening decision is irresponsible," said NCGOP Press Secretary Tim Wigginton. "North Carolina is burning, and Cooper incompetence continues to add gasoline to the fire. It is completely unacceptable for him to wait until the last minute to announce his new plan to micromanage our lives at the same time he continues to fail at managing basic functions of government." 

While Cooper plots his next ambush on North Carolina families, workers, and small businesses, his administration lags in processing unemployment claims. For the entirety of the pandemic, North Carolina has ranked dead last for actually getting money into the hands of North Carolinians. Cooper's incompetence manifests itself as a particular type of cruelty since he will arrest people trying to go back to work to feed their families, and he refuses to fix the unemployment claims process to get benefits for people in need. 

Cooper has single-handedly declined to release all the COVID data that people need to stay safe during the pandemic, so a coalition of media organizations, including the New York Times and Associated Press, had to sue the Cooper administration to force them to comply with the law. Two weeks ago, Congressman Greg Murphy, who, along with being a Congressman, is also a practicing doctor and medical school professor, confirmed that North Carolina had a fundamental flaw in our COVID response. 

###