Podcast
The Bottom Line from NC Newsline
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Every weekday, NC Newsline editor and veteran North Carolina policy observer Rob Schofield offers a 60-second take on the key policy issues that impact North Carolinians.
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The cruel incompetence of the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement tactics
Jul 31, 202500:01:05Tap to summarizeA woman cries after her husband is detained by federal agents during a mandatory immigration check-in in June in New York City. The Trump administration’s arrests have been catching a smaller share of criminals overall, and a smaller share of people convicted of violent and drug crimes, than the Biden administration did in the same time frame last year. (Photo by Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images) New research from the national news organization Stateline highlights some of the big flaws in the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement policies. While the administration has made much of its supposed commitment to cracking down on violent criminals and blaming Democrats for failing to do so, the research actually reveals a significant decline in this realm under Trump. Indeed, the numbers show that while Trump’s ICE has rounded up more people, the Biden administration did a much better job in capturing individuals convicted of serious crimes. During the first half of 2024, 53% of the people arrested for being unlawfully present in the U.S. had been previously convicted of crimes. Under Trump, the number has dropped to 40% as ICE has resorted to mass roundups. Arrests for those not convicted of any crime have nearly tripled. The bottom line: When combined with the practice of using terror tactics like masked officers and ignoring due process, these numbers reveal an immigration enforcement regime that is at once cruel, incompetent and un-American. The need for change is urgent. For NC Newsline, I’m Rob Schofield.
Transcribe →North Carolina officials should work to enact and protect AI regulation
Jul 30, 202500:01:04Tap to summarizeTechnologists say the hazy definition of “artificial intelligence” leaves a wide opening for companies to over-promise or over-market the capabilities of their products – or even render “AI” more of a marketing gimmick than a real technology. (Photo illustration by tolgart/Getty Images) The rapid development of artificial intelligence has the potential to spur amazing advances in human society that are definitely worth pursuing. That said, AI also has the potential to do dreadful harm that we must guard against. As one of the nation’s tech leaders, OpenAI’s Sam Hartman, explained recently, for all of AI’s amazing potential, it’s also easy to envision a world in which foreign adversaries could use AI to take down the power grid, or break into financial institutions and steal wealth from Americans. And it’s in light of this that North Carolina leaders should resist proposals from the Trump administration and Congressional Republicans to remove AI guardrails by eliminating safety and environmental regulations and prohibiting states from enacting consumer protections. The bottom line: As Hartman admitted, there remains much we don’t understand about AI and a real possibility that it could cause society to quote “veer in a sort of strange direction.” Elected leaders should do all they can to maintain human control over this powerful technology. For NC Newsline, I’m Rob Schofield.
Transcribe →NC Democrats and Republicans agree: Release the Epstein files
Jul 29, 202500:01:05Tap to summarizeA photograph of US President Donald Trump and convicted child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein is displayed after being unofficially installed in a bus shelter on July 17 in London, England. The president is facing criticism from his usually loyal Republican “Make America Great Again” (MAGA) supporters over suggestions that the administration is hiding details of Epstein’s crimes to protect the high profile figures he associated with, which included Trump (Leon Neal/Getty Images). Twenty years ago, investigative reporter Barry Levine started covering a wealthy socialite named Jeffrey Epstein. Five years ago, after he was convicted of sex crimes and died in jail, Levine published an acclaimed book on Epstein. And last week, as the controversy surrounding mountains of FBI data and evidence about Epstein slowly consumed the government and threatened the Trump presidency, Levine penned a powerful essay in the New York Times detailing the questions to which Americans deserve answers. His central message – quote “With the exception of redactions required to protect the innocent and materials that must be withheld while under court seal, the complete F.B.I. files should be released.” And amazingly in these divided times, most North Carolina Democrats and Republicans agree. As Senator Thom Tillis put it succinctly, “release the damn files.” The bottom line: President Trump, as well as many other prominent people were close to Epstein and for the good of the country, Americans deserve to know the full truth about whether any of them were involved in his criminality. For NC Newsline, I’m Rob Schofield.
Transcribe →Lawmakers should sustain Gov. Stein’s vetoes, enact a new state budget
Jul 28, 202500:01:05Tap to summarizeGovernor Josh Stein applies his veto stamp to a bill on Wednesday, July 2, 2025. (Screenshot from Governor’s Office X video.) Like the rest of the nation, North Carolina faces some enormous policy challenges these days. Thanks to sustained disinvestments in an array of core public services, our state is fast becoming coarser, less healthy and more divided. Unfortunately, Republican legislative leaders seem unconcerned. Rather than working with Governor Josh Stein to tackle our numerous outsized problems, they spent the recent legislative session advancing divisive culture war bills and failing even to pass a new state budget for the fiscal year that began July 1. And now, rather than honestly owning up to and addressing their shortcomings, they’re returning to Raleigh this week to double down on them with a plan to override Stein’s vetoes of several destructive and hyper-partisan bills. And the overdue budget? It’s nowhere in sight. The bottom line: Caring and thinking lawmakers of both parties should take a stand against this failed and divisive strategy by sustaining Stein’s vetoes and sending a message to legislative leaders that it’s past time to end the games and work together for the good of all North Carolinians. For NC Newsline, I’m Rob Schofield.
Transcribe →Legislature bears responsibility for impending teacher and state employee premium hikes
Feb 13, 202500:01:04Tap to summarizeNorth Carolina General Assembly (File Photo) North Carolina public school teachers and state employees are badly underpaid. The chief cause: repeated and regressive tax cuts enacted by Republican legislators that have caused state revenues (as a share of the economy) to plummet over the past 15 years. Today, even states like Alabama and Mississippi do a better job of funding government. Amazingly, however, the situation is about to get worse. Thanks to the legislature’s ongoing failure to appropriate adequate funds and to require transparency in the contracts the State Health Plan negotiates with insurers and providers, the plan has a half-billion dollar deficit. And last week, plan trustees said they would impose sizable new premium hikes on enrollees of hundreds of dollars per year to close the gap. And this is simply wrong. The bottom line: the planned State Health Plan premium hikes are just the latest example of how our state legislature continues to wage an ideological war on public employees and, ultimately, the public services on which we all should have a right to depend. For NC Newsline, I’m Rob Schofield.
Transcribe →Hegseth’s revival of Fort Bragg name is too clever by half
Feb 12, 202500:01:05Tap to summarizeDefense Secretary Pete Hegseth signs a memorandum to rename Fort Liberty, N.C., to Fort Roland L. Bragg, while aboard a military aircraft en route to Germany, Feb. 10, 2025. Credit: Navy Petty Officer 1st Class Alexander Kubitza, DOD The Trump administration is making a mockery of a well-designed system the U.S. government has long employed for naming important places for historical figures. The latest example: Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s too-clever-by-half move to rename North Carolina’s Fort Liberty Army base as Fort Bragg. The name was changed from Bragg to Liberty just a couple years back at the conclusion of a long overdue process designed to end the practice of honoring officers of the Confederacy like General Braxton Bragg who took up arms against the U.S. during the Civil War. Unfortunately, such processes and values don’t mean anything to Trump and Hegseth so they’ve revived the name Bragg, while claiming it now honors a World War II private with the same surname. Please. What’s next? A base named after a Korean War marine named Robert E. Lee? The bottom line: Hegseth can cloak the move however he likes, but its true purpose as another attack on racial justice and basic norms of democratic governance is patently obvious. For NC Newsline, I’m Rob Schofield.
Transcribe →Experts to legislature: Please fund our public schools
Feb 11, 202500:01:05Tap to summarizePhoto: Getty Images The more state legislators avert their eyes and ears and pretend not to notice, the more that North Carolina public education experts continue to issue new and urgent pleas to adequately fund our public schools. Two of the most important voices weighed in with new entreaties in just the last few days. Both the Public School Forum of North Carolina and the state Board of Education released short and to-the-point lists of priorities for the 2025 General Assembly. Their requests: Fund schools adequately and equitably Dramatically improve the state’s near lowest-in-the-nation teacher pay Rebuild crumbling school facilities Address the crisis in student mental health and wellbeing Modernize the state’s system for assessing schools, and Demand accountability from taxpayer subsidized private schools. The bottom line: GOP state legislative leaders are willfully and destructively starving our public schools even as they heap mounds of cash on unaccountable private voucher schools. It’s essential that they reverse course before the damage becomes irreversible. For NC Newsline, I’m Rob Schofield.
Transcribe →NC legislature should stay in its own lane
Feb 10, 202500:01:05Tap to summarizeAttorney General Jeff Jackson said he joined a legal challenge to the federal funding freeze out of concern for “widespread and immediate damage” to North Carolinians. (Photo: Brandon Kingdollar) After having successfully gerrymandered their way to complete control of the state legislature over the last 15 years, you’d think North Carolina Republican lawmakers would be sure enough of themselves to at least occasionally countenance other voices. Unfortunately, you’d be wrong. The latest ridiculous example: a bill introduced last week that would effectively prevent the state’s attorney general from doing their job — serving as North Carolina’s top lawyer. Under the legislation — which is aimed at current AG Jeff Jackson for daring to question some of President Trump’s recent unconstitutional edicts — attorneys general would be barred forever from making an argument in any lawsuit that challenges a presidential executive order or any act of the legislature. Think they’d push such a bill if the attorney general was a Republican? The bottom line: The attorney general is elected by all the people of the state and sworn to enforce the constitution to the best of their ability. By attempting to silence and micromanage this important constitutional officer, lawmakers have set a new low for partisan and power-hungry vindictiveness. For NC Newsline, I’m Rob Schofield.
Transcribe →Throwing gas on a fire: GOP lawmakers look to worsen our state’s gun violence crisis
Feb 7, 202500:01:05Tap to summarize(Photo by Aristide Economopoulos/NJ Monitor) Gun violence is an epidemic in our society that kills almost 50,000 Americans every year, including close to 2,000 in North Carolina alone. Last year, the U.S. experienced more than 500 mass shootings. No other modern nation comes even close to these frightening rates. And yet, amazingly, over at the North Carolina General Assembly, Republican state legislative leaders seem bent on doing everything they can to make the situation even worse. In recent days, they’ve introduced multiple bills that would allow anyone 18 or older to carry a concealed weapon without any kind of training or permit. Yes, you heard that right. The bills would make it perfectly legal for a high schooler (someone who can’t legally buy a beer) to obtain and carry a concealed handgun in public — at the grocery store, in a movie theater, or just walking down the street — with no rules whatsoever. And you really can’t make this up. The bottom line: America’s gun violence crisis is a rapidly growing wildfire, that Republican lawmakers are preparing to douse with gasoline. For NC Newsline, I’m Rob Schofield.
Transcribe →Terrorizing innocent schoolchildren
Feb 6, 202500:01:05Tap to summarizePhoto: Getty Images/istock The Trump administration’s new and ham-handed anti-immigration policies are terrorizing innocent kids and disrupting our schools. In numerous places, U.S. citizen children who’ve lived here their entire lives go to school each day fearing their non-citizen parents may not be at home when the school day ends. As NC Newsline reported this week, teachers and parents in Cabarrus and Durham Counties say worries about the crackdown are causing big problems in their communities. One Cabarrus County middle schooler even asked his teacher quote “if ICE comes to school, can I jump out of the window and run?” And needless to say, when children come to school this fearful, it’s disruptive to the entire school. One Durham mom described her children’s school not as the safe place it should be, but as a place of worry and anxiety. The bottom line: The U.S. needs comprehensive immigration law reform now that provides a pathway out of the shadows for millions of good people. The Trump plan to rely on mass deportation and terror is a cruel and un-American strategy that will ultimately prove futile. For NC Newsline, I’m Rob Schofield.
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