RALEIGH, North Carolina – North Carolina’s controversial restrictions on public mask-wearing became law Thursday after GOP lawmakers successfully overrode a veto by the state’s Democratic governor.
The Senate gave its final seal of approval in a 30-13 override vote along party lines. The state House began the process on Wednesday, when it voted to annul Governor Roy Cooper’s veto during a long session that lasted late into the night.
The ban joins a list of more than 20 government vetoes that the GOP-dominated North Carolina General Assembly overrode last year. Republicans hold narrow supermajorities in both chambers.
The law, which comes into force immediately, contains language other than the invoice that lawmakers introduced this session for the first time. The original proposal eliminated a 2020 Bipartisan Rules implemented during the COVID-19 pandemic that allowed the use of masks for health reasons, provoking resistance from the public and some Democratic lawmakers. Lawmakers restored a medical exemption.
The law allows people to wear medical or surgical masks in public to prevent the spread of disease. Law enforcement and property owners may ask people to temporarily remove these masks to verify their identity.
The measure also increases the severity of punishment for crimes committed while wearing a mask and increases penalties for protesters who purposely block traffic.
An unrelated campaign finance provision was added to the bill during negotiations. The law allows federally registered committees to donate money to state political parties, tapping into pots of money that include unlimited contributions from individuals.
Several times during the bill’s progress through the legislature, GOP lawmakers said it was, in part, a response to widespread protests on university campuses against the war in Gaza.
“It’s time the madness was … at least slowed down, if not stopped,” one of the bill’s sponsors, Wilson County Republican Sen. Buck Newton, said last month.
More than 30 people were detained in a camp set up at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill to protest the war in Gaza. Many of the protesters wore masks.
Earlier this year, pro-Palestinian protesters blocked roads in Raleigh and Durham.
Opposition to the measure initially centered on removing the health care exemption, which Democratic lawmakers and other opponents said could harm immunocompromised people.
“You are turning caring people into criminals with this bill,” Mecklenburg County Democratic Sen. Natasha Marcus said in May.
These concerns were largely ignored, however, until Representative Erin Pare, Wake County’s only Republican member of the General Assembly, announced on the X that she would not vote for the bill if a healthcare exemption was not included. Approval of legislation skidded to a stopprompting GOP lawmakers to add a health care exemption.
The American Civil Liberties Union and other groups have said the bill stifles protesters’ free speech.
Now, most Democratic lawmakers are concerned about the election financing provision, which they say would lead to a lack of transparency in elections. Cooper cited the same provision as his main reason for vetoing the legislation.
General masking statutes date back to 1953 and were largely intended to restrict Ku Klux Klan activity in North Carolina, according to David Cunningham, a sociology professor at the University of Washington in St. The section of state laws that includes restrictions to the use of masks is entitled “Prohibited Secret Societies and Activities”.
In addition to the health exception, the law also exempts the use of masks in festive attire, in theatrical productions or in jobs where they are used to keep workers safe.
New York considering a ban which Democratic Gov. Kathy Hochul said would be a way to combat anti-Semitic acts committed by masked individuals. The measure would include exemptions for health and religious reasons. As in North Carolina, civil liberties groups in the state expressed concerns about how the ban would affect freedom of expression.
In Ohio last month, Attorney General Dave Yost cited the state’s existing mask restrictions when warning student protesters that he could charge them with crimes for using them.
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