CLASSY: Roy Cooper Pushes Fundraising Emails Asking for Donations While 500K+ Lose Jobs to Shutdown Policies

RALEIGH – There are plenty of essential activities that simply must go on; even in the face of a pandemic panic. The world keeps turning. However, begging people to donate their hard-earned money to your reelection campaign, right after you’ve decimated livelihoods across the state by decreeing business closures and issuing Stay-at-Home edicts, maybe a tad on the tone deaf side of things.

That’s what Roy Cooper’s campaign for reelection — the one launched in New York City — is busy at work doing.

Aww, woe is Roy! They fell short of their goal and have a deadline they might miss. The recipients of this email can certainly relate. Why, many of them are very likely falling short of their monthly goals to, well, pay their mortgage and provide for their families, on account of losing their job and all.

More than 500,000 North Carolinians have filed for unemployment claims in the last month or so, nearly all of them citing COVID-19 closures as the reason. In fact, one of the only places expanding their workforce these days is…the unemployment office. The N.C. Department of Employment Security (DES) is tripling its staff in order to process the flood of claims. A workforce of approximately 500 has nearly doubled already, with plans to reach more than 1,600 staff to tackle the surge.

Poor Roy hates sending those emails, but he knows that $100 million has already been paid out in unemployment claims so far, and that looks like a rich target for some campaign donations.