Policymakers in Raleigh filed some symbolic proposals this week that are not expected to advance. One seeks to ban same-sex marriage, while another would require the University of North Carolina and N.C. State to leave the ACC Conference for its boycott over House Bill 2.
Western Carolina University Political Science Professor Chris Cooper says the sponsors of the marriage proposal are not worried about bad press at home.
“All three of these districts are solidly Republican so that they’re able to play a little and get national media coverage and to say essentially ‘We don’t like the direction the state is going’,” Cooper said. “Politics is symbolic a lot of time and these kinds of bills are a good example of that.”
Cooper said every year, lawmakers have these conversation about “crazy bills, silly bills.”
“Only about a fifth of the bills that are introduced in any session ever make it to law,” he said. “Most of them don’t even get passed, so it’s easy to pick these up.”
State lawmakers are on break until Wednesday.