Moral Mondays return to Raleigh as faith leaders, activists protest ‘legislative coup’

Hundreds of protesters descended on the North Carolina Legislative Building Monday evening to demand lawmakers halt the passage of Senate Bill 382, a controversial power shift bill they decried as a “legislative coup.” The event marked the return of “Moral Monday” rallies in the state’s capital.

Led by Bishop William Barber — the eastern North Carolina preacher who rose to national fame during the first Moral Mondays protests over a decade ago  — the demonstrations began with a little over an hour of speeches in front of the State Capitol with brief interludes of jazz and gospel, as protesters sang civil rights movement standards like “This Little Light of Mine” and “Woke Up This Morning.”

After the speakers concluded, the activists marched down Bicentennial Plaza to deliver a letter to legislators — shouted from the gates of the Legislative Building — calling on the body to “cease and desist” efforts to pass SB 382 and instead enact “real, immediate relief.” Protesters lit up the plaza with a sea of multicolored flashlights, which they waved overhead as they strode to the General Assembly.

“Woe unto you who legislate evil, rob the poor of their rights, and make women and children your prey,” Barber whispered to the crowd, sitting in rapt silence. “I fear for you.”

The gathering follows a protest that packed the Senate gallery on Dec. 2 as state senators voted along party lines to override Gov. Roy Cooper’s veto of the power shift bill, which among other changes, places the State Board of Elections under the office of the State Auditor (set to be held by a Republican in January), removes two judges who have ruled unfavorably against the legislature, and shrinks the powers of the Attorney General, Lieutenant Governor, and state Superintendent of Public Instruction, all of whom are set to be Democrats.

Amid widespread backlash to the bill, Barber has sought to recapture the magic of Moral Mondays, a protest movement that began early in the last decade and at its height brought a flood of 80,000 demonstrators to Jones Street in 2014 to oppose the policies of then-Gov. Pat McCrory and the Republican-controlled legislature. While the group of hundreds that gathered Monday evening was a far cry from those days, Barber said he was not deterred, noting that the first Moral Monday began with just 17 in attendance.

Barber called the bill a “damnable moral shame” and demanded the legislature “leave our democracy the hell alone.” Several times throughout the rally, he chanted: “We don’t need a disastrous bill, we need a bill for the disaster.”

Speakers at the Monday evening rally decried not just the contents of the bill itself, but that the changes were labeled as facets of hurricane relief to western North Carolina, when it would allocate just $252 million for relief and provide few new uses for those funds.

“That bill does not deliver the needed aid to my community, but rather, it subverts our democracy as a power grab and ignores the will of the people,” said Vicki Meath, the executive director of Asheville’s Just Economics. “That is a slap in the face to western North Carolina. We see what you are doing and we will not forget.”

She thanked the legislators who voted against SB 382, naming the three Republicans who did so — Majority Whip Karl Gillespie (R-Macon), Rep. Mike Clampitt (R-Swain), and Rep. Mark Pless (R-Haywood). “They put people and their constituents over their party in opposition to this bill.”

Barber took it a step further. “We call on those three Republicans to stand strong. Forget what the party says, and remember what God tells you: Care for the brokenhearted, and care for the least of these,” he said. “One day, you have to face something greater than Trump, and greater than the GOP.”

Jen Hampton, an organizer with Just Economics and Asheville Food and Beverage United, relayed the story of a single mother in her union set to be evicted after Hurricane Helene destroyed her livelihood at Biltmore Village and lawmakers failed to deliver rental assistance.

“She is likely to be served an eviction notice this week, and will be living in a car with her seven-year-old daughter by Christmas,” Hampton said, her voice breaking. “This little western North Carolina family was doing fine before Helene. Now, this mother is struggling, trying to get warm sleeping bags so her child doesn’t freeze to death.”

Hampton called on the legislature to “stop playing games with our lives” and “do your jobs” — a chant that reverberated through the crowd shortly after.

Barber said his organization, Repairers of the Breach, would commit $25,000 to families like the one Hampton described. “She will not stay in that car,” he vowed.

He urged the protesters to come back to the legislature at 10:30 a.m. on Wednesday morning for another demonstration ahead of the state House of Representatives’ vote on the veto override. He added that he plans to bring Moral Mondays to Asheville in the near future to draw attention to the continuing crisis post-Helene.

Susan Weaver of Durham, who attended a few of the earlier Moral Mondays and came back to stand up to the power shift bill, urged lawmakers to take heed of the wave of opposition from North Carolinians.

“Follow the constitution, the law, and do the right thing,” she said. “Make sure every vote counts and quit taking power away from officials just to control everything.”