He's about as moderate as a Tasmanian Devil:

When a mob of President Trump’s supporters stormed the Capitol building on Wednesday, they forced an emergency recess in the Congressional proceedings to officially certify the results of the 2020 presidential election. When the Senate reconvened at 8 p.m., and the House of Representatives an hour later, the proceedings — including the objection debates — continued, although some lawmakers who had previously planned to vote with the objectors stood down following the occupation of the Capitol. Plans to challenge a number of states after Arizona were scrapped, as well — but one other objection, to Pennsylvania’s results, also advanced to a vote.

How about those "states' rights," y'all? No? Of course not, if they happen to conflict with what Donald Trump wants. Budd may have been groomed and propelled into office by Club For Growth, but he's been a Trump lapdog since he oozed into DC. The above proves that he doesn't care about voters or preserving democracy, but how does he feel about other things? Like hungry babies?:

RT for awareness but it is a sad state of affairs in NC that classrooms in public schools are not equipped with adequate supplies without external help #ncpol https://t.co/ms9TNO8d4E

— James Glenos (@jamesglenos) July 11, 2022

It's nothing short of infuriating. Teachers and their advocates have been purchasing basic education supplies out of their pockets for years, but most parents don't bat an eye. Meanwhile BergerMoore is throwing another $100 million at private school vouchers. Grrr...

I'ma let Rob Schofield take the wheel while I talk Evil Steve down from his precarious perch:

As noted in States Newsroom reporter Jacob Fischler’s remarkable and detailed report, the sworn testimony of a top aide to Trump’s former chief of staff — North Carolina’s own Mark Meadows — made clear that, among other things, Trump became completely unhinged on the day of the insurrection. According to Cassidy Hutchinson’s riveting and compelling testimony, Trump even went so far as to: urge the admission of armed attendees to his infamous pre-insurrection speech, defend demonstrators calling for the assassination of Vice President Mike Pence, and physically assault a Secret Service agent in a bizarre attempt to commandeer the presidential limousine.

Repeatedly, Hutchinson’s sworn testimony made clear that, if he wasn’t already, Donald Trump became a raving and dangerous maniac on January 6, 2021 and played a key role in instigating and sustaining a deadly assault on democratic government that was one of the worst events in American history.

Donald Trump has broken so many laws it's impossible to list them all. Many of them were money-related (fraud & tax evasion), some were textbook RICO violations (threatening Georgia's Sec State to "find" votes), and some were crimes against our very nation (seditious conspiracy, treason, etc.). And it didn't take Hercule Poirot to figure that shit out, either. His guilt is obvious, even to the slowest of the slow. It's time for indictments. I'm not confident a jury will find him guilty, because 30% of our population is bat-shit crazy. But it needs to happen anyway.

Will NC be the first stop on a new underground railroad?

Its impact will spread far beyond Mississippi’s 15-week abortion law. By renouncing Roe and Casey (and decades of other abortion cases that relied on those decisions), the decision permits states to implement far more restrictive abortion laws. Mississippi itself has indicated that it will enforce a different state law, passed in 2007, that prohibits virtually all abortions, except to save the life of the mother or in cases involving rape. A dozen other states have passed similar legislation, known as “trigger laws” because they were drafted to go into effect if Roe and Casey were overturned. An analysis by the Guttmacher Institute predicts that 26 states are likely to ban all or nearly all abortions.

By now everybody reading this is already aware of the Court's ruling. While the anger and frustration will be with us for a long time, we need to start looking at practical measures, strategic measures, that will provide as much assistance to women as possible. As you can see from the map, North Carolina (and Virginia) will soon be the Southeast's only option for women seeking an abortion. But many of them are going to need help accessing that right:

And their actions speak volumes:

Sens. Thom Tillis and Richard Burr voted Thursday against the bill they helped craft that would benefit veterans from Camp Lejeune who were exposed to toxic chemicals in the base’s water for nearly three decades. A version of this bill did pass the House 256-174 in March, with mixed results from North Carolina’s 13 representatives. Reps. David Rouzer, Patrick McHenry, Madison Cawthorn, Dan Bishop, Ted Budd and Virginia Foxx, all Republicans, voted against the bill.

The Honoring our PACT Act of 2021 would provide health care through the Department of Veteran Affairs to veterans exposed to toxic substances, ensures veterans aren’t forced to prove their exposure before receiving care and makes improvements to the department’s process for receiving care for exposure.

This subject is not new to BlueNC readers; it's been on our radar for over 12 years. Understand, this bill doesn't "give away" a bunch of taxpayers' dollars, it merely provides health care treatment for military and civilians recklessly exposed to toxic chemicals while working for the DoD. And big surprise: that is expensive. It's also not surprising the VA's budget has grown exponentially over the last twenty years thanks to our wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. $300 Billion and rising. But pay attention to Randall Stagner in this clip: