North Carolina Gov.-elect Roy Cooper's powers were already likely to be limited. | AP Photo Cooper threatens to sue over North Carolina GOP 'power grab' Legislation proposed by Republicans would strip the governor of some authority.

North Carolina Gov.-elect Roy Cooper on Thursday threatened to file a lawsuit against the state's GOP-dominated Legislature over Republicans' push to sharply limit gubernatorial powers before Cooper takes office.

"If I believe these measures are unconstitutional, they will see me in court and they don't have a good track record there," Cooper, currently the state attorney general and a Democrat, said at a news conference. Cooper said the Legislature was pushing to pass major changes to the state's laws "in the dark of night with little debate." The new bills are being considered as part of a special session originally convened to consider disaster relief.


"Most people might think this is a partisan power grab, but it's really more ominous," Cooper said.

Legal experts suggested Cooper’s options in court might be limited, but that he could extract political payback. A federal court recently struck down North Carolina’s state legislative maps for illegally packing black voters into a few legislative districts. The court has ordered new elections in November 2017, and Democrats hope they can punish GOP lawmakers at the ballot back then.

The legislation proposed by Republicans would reduce the number of state government employees Cooper can hire and fire at will from 1,500 to 300, strip the governor of the power to appoint trustees to the University of North Carolina and give it to the General Assembly, and require Senate confirmation for Cabinet appointments. Another proposal would shift control of one state office from the governor to the lieutenant governor — who will still be a Republican next year.

Cooper won November's election by a little more than 10,000 votes. Outgoing GOP Gov. Pat McCrory and other Republicans tried to challenge the outcome in court, raising claims of widespread voter fraud that local election boards rejected. McCrory conceded earlier this month after a protracted fight over the results.

That fight was litigated county by county before election boards controlled by the governor's party. Under current state law, that power would shift to Democrats once Cooper takes office, but the bill Republican legislators are pushing would split the boards equally between members of the two parties instead of letting Democrats take control. It would also give Republicans control of the state election board in even years, when major elections take place. (Democrats would control the chairmanships in odd years.)

Cooper drew comparisons between the current proposals and HB2, the controversial "bathroom law" that opponents have criticized as discriminatory and has been widely credited for sinking McCrory even as Republican President-elect Donald Trump and Sen. Richard Burr carried North Carolina this fall.

"We don’t want another disaster like House Bill 2. This is exactly why we had problems with House Bill 2, because they wanted to do it in secret," Cooper said. "They’re major changes in North Carolina law. They deserve debate. They deserve deliberation."

During a later interview with Chuck Todd, host of “Meet the Press,” Cooper doubled down on his claims that the Legislature is venturing into unconstitutional territory. The fact that the Legislature called a second special session, Cooper added, could leave it vulnerable to a legal challenge.

“We're still looking at it all. The whole process of how they called themselves into this second special session is questionable,” the governor-elect said. “So potentially everything that they do at this point is unconstitutional.”

Other Democrats have gone further than Cooper, calling the proposed changes a "coup." Republicans have defended the measures as necessary to restore the balance of power between different branches of state government, but there's no indication any of the proposals were under consideration when McCrory was still governor.

"I think to be candid with you, that you will see the General Assembly look to reassert its constitutional authority in areas that may have been previously delegated to the executive branch," state House Rules Committee Chairman David Lewis told reporters on Wednesday, according to the Raleigh News & Observer.

And it’s not clear what resources the executive branch will have to fight back. “I’m not sure I can think of a knockout legal punch or a sure-fire winner,” said Michael Gerhardt, a law professor at the University of North Carolina who has advised the Clinton-era Justice Department and Democratic senators.

Gerhardt said Cooper could try to argue Republican legislators were essentially trying to “destroy or diminish” the office of governor in violation of the state constitution. “This kind of scenario is unprecedented,” he said.

Morgan Jackson, a Democratic political strategist who worked on Cooper’s reelection campaign, suggested Republicans were dealing themselves a self-inflicted wound ahead of the new elections in 2017. Depending on the new legislative maps, Jackson argued, it’s possible Democrats could win back a legislative chamber.

“There’s a chance for real Democratic gains in 2017,” he said. “They’re setting themselves up for a wave.”

Jackson said the use of a special session to pass controversial legislation with little discussion was similar to HB2, which was widely blamed for Democratic gains at the state level in North Carolina.

“It’s backfired on them before,” he said. “You’d think they would’ve learned their lesson.”

Cooper's powers were already likely to be limited. While the governor-elect has proposed expanding Medicaid and investing in renewable energy, Republicans — thanks in part to a heavily gerrymandered legislative map — hold veto-proof majorities in both of North Carolina's legislative chambers.

Tensions over the Legislature’s actions spilled over during a news conference inside the state Legislature's building on Thursday.

According to a News & Observer report, Alan McSurely, an attorney with the North Carolina NAACP, and Dallas Woodhouse, executive director of the state GOP, traded barbs when Woodhouse crashed the conference.

McSurely said the event was “the first meeting he’s [Woodhouse] been in in the last two or three days that wasn’t composed of all white people.” But Woodhouse clearly had enough and cut off McSurely as the attorney began to attack the Legislature’s actions.

“Hey, Alan, since you’re calling me out, what about when [former Gov.] Jim Hunt tried to fire all the Republicans in the Christmas massacre?" Woodhouse said. "What about the Democrats stripping the lieutenant governor, a Republican, of all his power? Was that right? I’m just curious. Or stripping [former Republican Gov.] Jim Martin of his hiring authority?”

Democrats also picked up a majority on the state Supreme Court in November, and the party has feared Republicans could try to prevent that majority from taking shape by adding two new justices to the court and appointing conservatives to fill those seats. Republicans haven’t made such a move yet. But Gerhardt warned that could lead to a lawsuit. “You’d see a much stronger Voting Rights Act claim,” he said.

Brent Griffiths contributed to this report.