Roy Cooper rallies student vote

N.C. Attorney General Roy Cooper, a potential 2016 gubernatorial candidate, spoke on campus Tuesday to mobilize student involvement in the 2014 and 2016 elections.

During the event, hosted by UNC Young Democrats, Cooper stressed the importance of the Democratic cause in re-electing N.C. Sen. Kay Hagan in November, encouraging students to rally people to vote early and to educate themselves on their voting choices.

“I don’t think we can take back the House and the Senate in 2014, but we can make incremental progress,” he said.

Cooper said North Carolina has been a “beacon” in the South for progress-driven people, but he said that has changed with the election of a governor and legislature with an extreme agenda.

While working to elect Democratic officials this cycle, Cooper reminded students to keep the next gubernatorial elections in mind.

“I hope you stay in North Carolina to help us do this in 2016,” he said. “This is when we are going to take back our state.”

While Cooper said in an interview that it is too early to make any official announcements about his own run for governor in 2016, he said he is strongly considering it.

“I’m deeply concerned about where the state is headed. I want to be a part of change,” he said.

Shauna Rust, UNC junior and co-president of the Campus Y, said it was inspiring to hear Cooper talk about the direction he hopes state politics will take.

“It was just really exciting to think about, even though we may not get a liberal majority in the House or the Senate this year, the progress we can make in the years to come,” she said.

Cooper also spoke about the state of public education, expressing his concern about teachers leaving North Carolina for neighboring states to get better pay.

Troy Homesley, a first-year UNC law student, said he was glad to hear Cooper address education.

“I think that’s one of the things most North Carolinians are frustrated about because they see it as something that’s taken 40, 50 years to build up, through the work of people like Bill Friday, Jim Hunt; swept out from underneath us in only a few years,” he said.

Cooper also spoke about the voting law passed in 2013, calling them the toughest voting laws in the country. But he said it’s his duty as attorney general to defend the voting law in court for the state when it goes to trial in 2015.

“I believe these laws should be changed because they make it harder for people to register and vote and that’s bad public policy, and I’m going to continue to speak out against that bad public policy, but our attorneys are going to continue to do their job,” he said in an interview.

Tony Liu, UNC sophomore and vice president of the Young Democrats, said Cooper’s address gave students a positive energy about voting in light of the upcoming elections.

“This is such an important election, regardless of who they vote for, in determining the fate of the Senate,” he said.

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