this post was submitted on 06 Oct 2023
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United States | News & Politics

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RALEIGH, N.C. (CN) — North Carolina lawmakers have been exempted from public records requests, through an item in the North Carolina budget which took effect Monday at midnight and was three months late.

Buried in the 625-page document allocating $30 billion in funding are provisions that shield legislators from public records requests, even once they’ve left office.

Section 27.7 of the 2023 Appropriations Act (HB 259) categorizes documents prepared by legislative employees as confidential, rather than public records, and their existence “may not be revealed” without the consent of the legislator.

The budget also names legislators “custodian of documents” to discern if a record is a public record or not, and to choose to retain or destroy it. They also cannot be required to reveal any documents or information requests made while they were in office.

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[–] pete_the_cat@lemmy.world 87 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Buried in the 625-page document allocating $30 billion in funding are provisions that shield legislators from public records requests, even once they’ve left office.

Doing shit like this should be illegal.

[–] FederatedSaint@lemmy.world 23 points 2 years ago (1 children)
[–] pete_the_cat@lemmy.world 2 points 2 years ago

Nah, they've been doing this for years (bury one thing inside another).

[–] DevCat@lemmy.world 50 points 2 years ago

This is how you hide your crimes.

[–] mojo@lemm.ee 31 points 2 years ago

Then they're no longer working for the public

[–] Maeve@kbin.social 26 points 2 years ago (2 children)

Does FOIA not have supremacy?

[–] Dozzi92@lemmy.world 30 points 2 years ago (1 children)

It's just one challenge at the federal level that makes this all go away. Hopefully. Unless higher courts are incompetent or equally corrupt. But this is America right, where things like that don't happen because of the Constitution or some shit.

[–] Redditsucks1@lemmy.world 22 points 2 years ago (1 children)

It's not like there's corruption in the Supreme Court or anything. Thank god we have them to trust.

[–] Neve8028@lemm.ee 3 points 2 years ago

Honestly don't think that this would make it through the supreme court. They need to knock down legislation like this to get headlines and take focus away from their own corruption. Gotta love American politics.

[–] geekworking@lemmy.world 4 points 2 years ago

They are getting around this by classifying all records as personal records so that they are not subject to any public records rules.

[–] badbytes@lemmy.world 11 points 2 years ago (2 children)

I'm OK with calling North Carolina, part of the south.

[–] DarthBueller@lemmy.world 11 points 2 years ago

Um. Was there any question? Any illusions I had about the state were shattered for me two years into Obama’s first term.

[–] EmpathicVagrant@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago

Far as I’m concerned there’s only one Carolina.