Roy Cooper prison settlement is under fire as Republicans roll out a new probe.
RALEIGH, N.C. – North Carolina’s Republican-controlled General Assembly announced Monday the creation of a lopsided subcommittee stacked with 10 Republicans and only four Democrats to “investigate” former Gov. Roy Cooper’s handling of a court-ordered prison settlement during the deadly COVID-19 pandemic.
The target is a 2021 settlement agreement between the Cooper administration and civil rights groups, including the ACLU and NAACP, that safely released roughly 3,500 nonviolent individuals from overcrowded state prisons where conditions had become unconstitutional amid the virus outbreak.
Far from the “violent repeat offenders” narrative pushed by GOP leaders, the releases focused on people eligible for parole or already nearing the end of their sentences.
Republican House Speaker Destin Hall and Senate President Pro Tempore Phil Berger framed the move as protecting “public safety,” but critics across North Carolina see it as a politically motivated attack on one of the state’s most effective and popular Democratic leaders as he runs for the open U.S. Senate seat.
Cooper, who easily won the Democratic primary, consistently polls ahead of Republican nominee Michael Whatley in this critical race that could help determine control of the Senate.
The former governor’s administration acted responsibly during an unprecedented global health crisis, following a court process rather than making unilateral decisions. Democrats on the new subcommittee reportedly had no say in its formation.
Overcrowded prisons during the pandemic posed real risks not just to those incarcerated but to corrections staff, their families, and broader public health. Releasing low-risk, nonviolent individuals helped reduce density and prevent superspreader events inside facilities.
Republicans have repeatedly tried to tie the releases to rising crime, but independent analyses and data from the period show the settlement involved carefully vetted cases, many involving people who would have been released soon anyway.
The subcommittee, chaired by Sen. Buck Newton (R-Wilson) and Rep. Brenden Jones (R-Columbus), will also broadly review the state’s prison system. Yet the timing—right after Cooper secured the Democratic nomination and while he holds a solid lead in polls against Whatley—makes the true intent clear that this is to distract voters from real issues like healthcare, education funding, and economic opportunity in North Carolina.
