CHARLOTTE — North Carolina Speaker of the House Thom Tillis (R-Mecklenburg) will be met with protest when he appears in Cornelius, N.C., tomorrow for a public Q&A and town hall meeting.
Tillis’ legislative forum will take place at the Cornelius Town Hall, 21445 Catawba Ave., at 6 p.m. He’s expected to take questions and provide answers on a variety of issues. In particular, the meeting will serve as an opportunity for Tillis to reconnect with his district’s constituents.
“He wants a chance to hear from his district,” spokesman Jordan Shaw told Davidson News. “Being speaker has taken on a life of its own, and he doesn’t want anyone to think he’s forgotten about the 98th district.”
The North Carolina AFL-CIO plans to picket the event, where they plan on sending a simple message: “We are Watching: Workers are Watching: Voters are Watching, Taxpayers are Watching.”
Tillis has presided over a rocky legislative session that marked the first time Republicans had control over both chambers of the North Carolina General Assembly in over a century. Lawmakers’ regular session and a special July session on redistricting came under fire as progressive advocacy groups and citizens took issue with many of the GOP’s proposed budget cuts and other initiatives.
Gov. Bev Perdue vetoed the GOP budget, thought it was later overridden. Legislators also overrode Perdue’s veto of the controversial “Women’s Right to Know” bill, which adds extra restrictions and regulations including a 24-hour waiting period for abortion procedures. Attempts to override the governor’s veto of a controversial voter identification bill failed, though there has been indication legislators will attempt its passage county-by-county in a series of local bills over which Perdue has no veto authority.
An anti-LGBT constitutional amendment that could ban marriage, civil unions and domestic partnerships will likely come up in another special session scheduled for September. Lawmakers briefly considered hearing the amendment in July.