Former state Rep. Bruce Goforth who lost to current Rep. Patsy Keever in last year’s Democratic primary, has changed his registration to Unaffiliated and taken a job with Speaker Tom Tills, a Republican, as an adviser on jobs and the economy.
Goforth, who served four terms in the House and rose to become a majority whip, was trounced in the primary, with Keever taking 59.8 percent of the vote, touting her progressive platform and credentials.
Goforth will make $60,000 a year in his new position, and according to the Associated Press, Tillis has said Goforth’s private sector experience as a contractor will help in finding ways to create jobs.
— David Forbes, senior news reporter
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It’s great to see General Assembly reaching across the party aisle to help formulate jobs policy.
It looks like Mr Goforth is really only concerned with remaining on the public payroll …. which would include taxpayer funded healthcare if I don’t miss my guess.
I’ll bet he will be a Republican again when the next election rolls around.
The man is shameless.
Politics is not meant o be a career!
Coalition government and conservative politics in the US are different things. As far as I can tell the GOP generally wants other groups to be flexible to their agenda and nothing else.
Identifying politicians interested in a real coalition form of governance at all levels would be a good project for someone. What ‘bipartisianship’ usually means is mixing 40% of the milquetoast leadership persective with 50% of the horrible ideas and ideas that are meant to waste time.
The 10% of of ideas that may be on both sides gets buried in the nonsense and the ’Ninty Percenters’ feel comfortable.
I know Bruce & he’s a nice guy. However, this $60,000 of what appears to be taxpayer $ is ridiculous. We have 545 people at the federal level, many more at the state & local level all professing to be worrying about the economy & jobs. And his input would be greater than what is already on the table? And we are surprised that deficits continue to go up!
Okay – now I’m curious: Is he being paid?
I don’t see anything wrong with that per-se – I just didn’t know that you could be paid to be an adviser to a state-level politician.
– pvh
I’m with Paul on this one.
Isn’t $60,000 more than the Speaker himself makes ($38,151 annually plus $1,413 monthly stipend per the NCGA website) and much, much more than the other House Representatives?
Would love to hear more details on the nature of this position.
“He changed his registration status because he said he didn’t feel like a Democrat anymore in Buncombe County, which he said has been taken over by the party’s progressive wing.” http://is.gd/D8FqV6
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