On this date in 2018, as well as 2019, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” profiled North Carolina Lieutenant Governor Dan Forest, who was first elected to office back in 2012 by a little less than seven thousand votes. Forest is a political legacy, as the son of former Congresswoman and rubber room candidate Sue Myrick (the gal who palled around with Islamic hate groups in the wake of 9/11, tried to get rock music banned in her hometown, and claimed God spoke to her through her toaster to tell her to run for office), who spent four years serving under former Gov. Pat McCrory during his administration, during some of the more dismal policy failures the Tar Heel State has seen in several years (that are a lot of the reason why McCrory was only a one-term governor). Perhaps the biggest political disaster of the McCrory regime was North Carolina’s HB 2, a transphobic bathroom ban that allowed for the discrimination of LGBT citizens whose passage ended up costing the people of North Carolina over $3.7 billion in lost revenue due to several groups boycotting the state as a result and even some corporations choosing to move their operations elsewhere. And as the economic fallout from passing such a socially conservative law began to take its toll, a few more moderate members of the GOP around North Carolina started to admit that maybe… maybe they went too far. Dan Forest is most certainly not one of those reasonable souls.
You see, Dan Forest is a true Fundamentalist believer to his core. And he sat down with Tony Perkins, yes THAT Tony Perkins from the Family Research Council (which is still an anti-gay hate group) to tout the importance of HB 2, insisting that “if it protects one child or one woman “from being molested or assaulted, then it was worth it.” Note the wording… IF.
Because, and I know this might be shocking, there were no transgender attacks upon women or children in restrooms. There never were. But that didn’t stop Forest from lying his *** off about what the bill was meant to do:
“Well, our bill does not discriminate against anybody. In fact, the Charlotte ordinance was amazingly discriminatory against especially women and girls who no longer had the freedom to walk into a restroom and know that they would be safe and secure in that restroom without a man walking in or a pedophile or a predator walking into that bathroom.”
Now that we’ve established that Dan Forest has some issues with the LGBTQ community, in particular the “T”, what with hanging out with anti-gay hate groups and defending an anti-gay discrimination law…. Let’s talk about why this is going to matter going forward… one of the worst kept secrets right now in North Carolina politics is that when Forest is term-limited in 2020, he’s going to take a shot at preventing Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper from getting a second term in office. Forest almost immediately began attacking his sitting Governor for wanting to repeal the widely unpopular HB 2, and claiming that Roy Cooper, intends to we quote, “a ‘Look But Don’t Touch’ policy in our bathrooms.” That doesn’t sound like someone who is backing off of his bad move, does it?
But the levels of fanaticism already look to be well ingrained farther than even that. For years now, Forest has begun organizing a “Christian retreat” for political donors and allies known as “Black Mountain Weekend” where political players from North Carolina who cut their teeth working for monsters like Jesse Helms get together, hopefully without wearing hoods while they discuss a “Christian worldview”. And while Forest seems more than thrilled to discriminate against the LGBTQ community, he doesn’t discriminate nearly as much with the kind of company he keeps with fellow people at his retreat. Like Robin Webster, a Faith preacher who believes that you can help turn a gay person straight by beating it out of them. Every legal method of exploiting 501 (c3) law is being pushed, and apparently the bounds of the law aren’t enough for Forest’s backers, who already this year have gone far enough to donate an entire TV studio’s worth of equipment to Forest… illegally. He’s more than willing to collect all the donor money from the heads of charter schools at the cost of selling out North Carolina’s education system to them later on.
Not shockingly, Dan Forest has made some speeches of late that sound a wee bit like something a God-fearing white nationalist would say, including his June 28th, 2019 barn burner where he began ranting about how “no nation has survived the diversity and multiculturism that the United States faces today.”
Here’s a hint for spotting bigots, everyone… when they speak about diversity as if it’s a contagious disease upon the populace, that’s a huge tell. Another one? When you’re spreading lies about immigrants attacking “thousands of kids” in your state, and when you get called out for that disgusting lie, claiming that you “heard it from one lady” as if that’s a valid excuse to say something so irresponsible and hateful.
So, CSGOPOTD has had Dan Forest on our radar since early 2018, because he seems devoted enough to his bigoted cause that we want everyone to know his name by the time the ballots go out for Governor of North Carolina in 2020. This is a guy who you should smile about casting a vote against.
One Year Ago, February 10th, 2019: Dan Forest (NC)… 2019 Update
Two Years Ago, February 10th, 2018: Dan Forest (NC)… Original Profile
Three Years Ago, February 10th, 2017: Lee Bright (SC)… 2017 Update
Four Years Ago. February 10th, 2016: Lee Bright (SC)… Original Profile
Five Years Ago, February 10th, 2015: Kyle Dorsey (WI)