Last Call For McCrory's Honeymoon

If GOP NC Gov. Pat McCrory ever had a honeymoon, it died this month with the NC GOP.  The latest numbers from Public Policy Polling:

For the first time since taking office we find that McCrory has a negative approval rating this month. Only 40% of voters are happy with the job he's doing to 49% who disapprove. That's down a net 15 points from June when he was at a 45/39 spread. While McCrory's numbers are pretty steady with Republicans, he continues to lose ground with Democrats (down a net 17 points from -36 at 24/60 last month to now -53 at 17/70) and independents (down a net 20 points from +12 at 46/34 last month to -8 at 41/49 now). Only 68% of people who voted for McCrory last fall continue to approve of his job performance.

That's quite a drop, and it gets worse for McCrory when you throw the Republican-dominated state legislature into the mix.

Unhappiness over the abortion bill seems to be driving a lot of the increased unhappiness with the Republicans in state government this month. Only 34% of voters support the proposal to 47% who are opposed. They're even more unhappy with the process- 80% think it's inappropriate to combine abortion legislation with bills about motorcycle safety or Sharia Law.

This speaks to a greater issue voters have with the General Assembly's transparency- only 19% think the body is transparent in how it conducts its business to 51% who believe it is not. As a result North Carolinians think by a 48/33 margin that McCrory should veto the abortion law, including a 51/37 margin with independents.

The problem of course is that there are enough Republican votes in both the NC House and Senate to override a McCrory veto, meaning he's damned if he does and damned if he doesn't.  And the awful, draconian laws that McCrory has already signed into law are hurting him, too.

-55% of voters are unhappy with the legislation that resulted in 70,000 North Carolinians losing their unemployment benefits earlier this month to only 29% who are supportive of it. There's strong opposition to this development by both independents (32/55) and Democrats (10/78).

-76% of voters think that companies engaged in fracking in North Carolina should have to disclose all the chemicals they inject into the ground with only 13% opposed. Republicans in the State Senate have been trying to exempt them from having to do so. There's a strong bipartisan consensus (81/13 among independents, 80/9 among Democrats, 68/18 among Republicans) that disclosure should be required.

Even a majority of NC Republicans are worried about fracking chemicals, and with good reason.  And the nation's worst unemployment benefits?  Not exactly a selling point.  All of this could mean one hell of a backlash in November 2014:

All of this could come back to bite Republicans in next year's election. The GOP has an overall 35% approval rating for how it's running state government with 55% of voters disapproving. Democrats now lead the generic legislative ballot 51/42, the largest lead we've ever found for them since we started tracking this statistic.

North Carolinians have serious buyer's remorse for the GOP state they bought into.  Payback is going to be spectacular...but how much damage will the state's people take in the meantime from these GOP clowns?

We'll see.  If anything, Sen. Kay Hagan has a clear platform to run on in 2014 to keep her seat.