North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory, while fighting for GOP nominee Donald Trump in his state, is also fighting a tough battle for his own seat, and said Tuesday he believes liberals are trying to deflect attention from the state's economic and education successes and toward social issues such as the state's controversial bathroom bill.
"When I came to office, we had the fifth highest unemployment rate in the country — 9.4 percent unemployment," the governor told Fox News' "Fox & Friends" program. "We've lowered it to 4.7 percent. We've given teacher pay raises and paid off $6 billion in debt."
However, he thinks the economic and job numbers are coming through, and early voting turnout has worked to the advantage of Trump and Sen. Richard Burr, who is also seeking reelection, and "the passion for Hillary Clinton is not there in early voting whatsoever in comparison to the Barack Obama numbers of 2012."
Early voting has not benefited Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton, said McCrory, as there are more independents and Republicans voting early.
"She's getting the elite to vote for her, offering free university education," the governor said. "I think Mr. Trump and myself and Richard Burr are getting the hard working men and women of North Carolina to get out and vote. Many of them are voting that haven't in the past."
He said he also does not think that the bathroom bill will affect his race Tuesday against Attorney General Roy Cooper, and said he would not be angry if people blame him for economic losses that came as a result.
"We've got 300,000 new jobs in North Carolina since I've come into office," said McCrory. "By the way, Lady Gaga came last night. She didn't have any problem coming to North Carolina. There's a little bit of a hypocrisy there."
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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