July 23, 2004

HE RESIGNS NEXT WEEKEND:

Romney vetoes bill requiring special election for Kerry's seat (Associated Press, July 23, 2004)

Under current law, the governor would appoint a replacement, who would serve until the next general election in 2006.

Earlier this month, when the Democratic bill arrived on his desk for the first time, Romney sent it back with an amendment that would allow him to appoint a replacement until the special election took place. The Legislature rejected the compromise and sent the bill back to him.

While Romney's position on the bill has been evident from the start, he has admittedly dragged his feet on issuing the veto, taking full advantage of the 10 days allotted him in hopes that time would run out on the legislative session, which ends July 31.

The Legislature, however, intends to return to override the veto on Friday or Saturday, after the Democratic National Convention ends Thursday evening.

Posted by Orrin Judd at July 23, 2004 11:04 PM
Comments

I still say he won't. But if the DNC is dragging and Kerry isn't getting a bump out of it he might pull the cord to try and generate some noise for his campaign.

Posted by: AWW at July 23, 2004 11:58 PM

Right now he has lawyers researching ways for him to be Senator and President. He's certainly not going to take the chance of being neither.

Posted by: David Cohen at July 24, 2004 12:25 AM

Why aren't they using their normal procedure of finding a compliant judge or two to just make up some right or law that was never known to exist before? Why in this case are they recognizing that there's law and tradition that needs to be changed by actually legislating?

Another point-- Doesn't N.C have a Dem governor? If Kerry would quit, that would allow Edwards to do likewise, and give Bowles the opportnity to run as incumbent, even if only for a few weeks.

Posted by: Raoul Ortega at July 24, 2004 8:52 AM

Raoul - as for NC I've seen the argument that the Dem governor is in a tight race and pulling a stunt like that (putting Bowles into Edwards empty seat) could really hurt his reelection chances (he's already in trouble for raising taxes a bunch of times). And with 3 months to go before the election (including the August recess) it's hard to argue Bowles would gain much incumbency.

Posted by: AWW at July 24, 2004 3:42 PM
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