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Leader a force in N.C. politics: Basnight a kingmaker who works behind scene
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Published: November 9, 2008
RALEIGH
In the mid-1990s, Marc Basnight, one of the state's most powerful politicians, personally recruited two young lawyers to run for the North Carolina Senate.
Neither of them had ever held elective office, but Basnight, the Democratic leader of the Senate, persuaded them to run. Their names were Kay Hagan and Walter Dalton, and with Basnight's help, they quickly rose through the legislative ranks.
Around that same time, Basnight personally picked another up-and-coming state senator, appointing her to a powerful post as a key budget writer. Her name? Bev Perdue.
That was more than 10 years ago. Now, in 2008, Basnight remains one of North Carolina's most influential figures. And after last week's elections, his proteges now populate the halls of power far beyond the Senate chamber.
Perdue was elected Tuesday as the state's next governor. Hagan was elected to the U.S. Senate. And Dalton was elected as the next lieutenant governor.
The list doesn't end there. Janet Cowell, the newly elected state treasurer, was another Basnight lieutenant, as was Attorney General Roy Cooper when he served in the legislature in the 1990s.
"All those individuals owe something to (Basnight) for their rise in politics," said Bob Phillips, the executive director of Common Cause North Carolina, which fights for clean government and campaign reform.
"Does that translate to a significant increase of influence for him? I guess my thoughts are, these are all independent-minded folks."
Basnight said in an interview last week that his proteges' success in the election was due to their positions of supporting jobs and education and helping those who can't help themselves.
"It would not be because of me, I can assure you of that," he said.
Basnight insists that Hagan, Perdue and his other former foot soldiers are strongly independent and do not take marching orders from him.
"I can promise you that their freedom of opinion was not harnessed by me, and certainly is not now," Basnight said. "At no time did I control their ideas or their vision."
But even Basnight agreed that they share a common ideology. They are all moderate, pro-business Democrats, and they all emerged from a core group of state senators, led by Basnight and his second in command, Tony Rand, who have maintained tight control of the state's upper legislative chamber for 15 years.
"Currently, the Democratic Party out of the state Senate, for whatever reason, seems to be able to groom and nurture a bunch of potential folks to run" for statewide office, Phillips said.
Part of the reason is that Basnight, who is from Dare County, has been the president pro tempore of the N.C. Senate for so long -- a record eight two-year terms, which are expected to become nine next month when the legislature reconvenes. In that position, Basnight appoints hundreds of state officials, and he influences virtually every important piece of legislation, from the creation of the N.C. Lottery to the annual decisions on how to spend millions of tax dollars.
Rand, from Cumberland County, has held the post of Senate majority leader since 2001.
That has meant that ambitious state senators have faced a leadership ceiling, causing them to look outside the state Senate to run for higher office.
Republicans have sharply criticized the way that Basnight and his team operate and consolidate power. Basnight and the Democratic budget writers have done much of the work on annual state budgets out of the public eye and with no Republican input.
They also try to manage debate on the Senate floor to limit Republican opposition. Perdue, who presided over Senate sessions for the past eight years as lieutenant governor, has played a big role. She decided whom to call on at key moments in debate, and when to cut off debate altogether.
"I think if you've got people who are used to making decisions in private about the public's business and have a history of silencing debate, that could be something of a problem," said state Sen. Phil Berger, a Rockingham County Republican who is the Senate minority leader.
"And I think that's all things you've seen within that Senate core group."
That core group is now dispersed throughout elected positions in the executive branch and, in the case of Hagan, in Congress. Though they are still Basnight allies to some degree, they have each now been elected statewide, giving them their own independent political base, several political observers said. As a practical matter, it's unclear how much influence Basnight could exert -- even if he wanted to -- in offices such as the state treasurer or U.S. senator.
"It's more like he's got friends, in that they know each other and they're in the same party. It's not as much as he put them there," said Ran Coble, the executive director of the N.C. Center for Public Policy Research, a nonpartisan group in Raleigh.
The relationship between Basnight and Perdue will be more closely scrutinized because each is so important to the other's political fate. During her run for governor, Perdue faced charges that she was merely a pawn of Basnight's.
But Basnight disputes that, saying that in Democratic caucus meetings, Perdue sometimes disagreed with him. He said that in the late 1990s, she pushed to reduce the state's food tax -- a proposal that Basnight opposed.
"She offered a good argument, and I offered a counterargument, and I lost, and Beverly won, and the caucus prevailed," Basnight said.
His other proteges have also disagreed with him from time to time, he said. "My opinion has been changed many times" by each of them.
"Each of these members have challenged me many times, many times," he said. "And that's what I always have encouraged."
Berger said that the public should keep an eye on the management style of Basnight and his allies in both the legislative and executive branches.
Perdue has promised to bring greater transparency to the governor's office than her predecessor, Gov. Mike Easley.
Easley also has a close working relationship with Basnight, but has not been considered one of his proteges.
If Tuesday's successes for statewide Democratic candidates herald more behind-the-scenes influence for Basnight, it will be an inflation of a sphere of authority that is already very big.
"Senator Basnight already was -- if not the most -- certainly one of the most influential politicians in the state of North Carolina over the past 10 or 15 years," Berger said. "Even without the results of this past election."
■ James Romoser can be reached at 919-210-6794 or at jromoser@wsjournal.com.
Rising to power
Five Democrats who won statewide elections last week once served as top lieutenants to Marc Basnight in the N.C. Senate. They are:
•Bev Perdue, incoming governor. In 1995, Basnight chose Perdue to be chairwoman of the powerful Appropriations Committee. Starting in 2001, as lieutenant governor, Perdue worked closely with Basnight in her role of presiding over Senate sessions.
•Kay Hagan, incoming U.S. senator. Basnight recruited Hagan to run for the N.C. Senate, where he chose her to be an appropriations chairwoman.
•Walter Dalton, incoming lieutenant governor. Basnight recruited Dalton to run for the N.C. Senate, and he chose him to be an appropriations chairman.
•Janet Cowell, incoming state treasurer. Cowell served two terms in the N.C. Senate, and Basnight made her chairwoman of two committees.
•Roy Cooper, attorney general. Cooper served as Senate majority leader under Basnight before running for attorney general in 2000. On Tuesday, Cooper was elected to his third term as attorney general.
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