Inmates need ‘healthcare not handcuffs’

Democratic US Senate candidate and former Gov. Roy Cooper said that “criminals need healthcare, not handcuffs” while listing some of his major accomplishments as governor at a recent campaign event, according to audio obtained by Breitbart News. Republicans highlighted the comments as evidence of a weak approach to crime.

“We were able to be the best state for business three out of the last four years when I was governor,” said Cooper, according to the audio. “We were able to finally, finally get a Republican legislature to expand Medicaid in North Carolina. And you know what? The rural counties have benefited more than anybody else because people here needed it. And we were able to get even tough-on-crime Republican sheriffs to recognize that a lot of people in the jail needed healthcare and not handcuffs.”

Going after Cooper for being “soft on crime” has been one of the campaign messaging priorities of Michael Whatley, the Republican nominee running against Cooper, who is the former chairman of the Republican National Committee and the NCGOP. During a campaign event last month, Whatley went after Cooper over his crime policies.

“Roy Cooper is so pro-criminal that he released violent offenders, pushed the defund the police agenda, and turned North Carolina into a sanctuary for criminal illegal aliens. No one has done more damage to public safety than soft-on-crime Cooper,” RNC spokeswoman Emma Hall told Carolina Journal.

Whatley brought out Stephen Frederico, the father of Logan Frederico, who was murdered in Columbia, South Carolina, allegedly by Alexander Dickey, who had previously been arrested 39 times. Logan Frederico was a 22-year-old native of Waxhaw, North Carolina. Her father, Stephen, told his story of what he went through when his daughter was murdered in May of 2025.

“Listening to the clip, it sounds like there was some context in Cooper’s head that did not make it out of his mouth,” Andy Jackson, director of the Civitas Center for the Public Integrity at the John Locke Foundation, told the Carolina Journal. “That is an uncharacteristic gaffe from a politician with a reputation as a smooth talker. The most generous interpretation is that he meant to say that people with mental health problems could avoid jail if they got early treatment for their conditions.”

Cooper now holds a 12.5-point lead over Republican Michael Whatley in the race for North Carolina’s open US Senate seat, according to the latest Carolina Journal Poll of 600 likely general election voters. Support for Cooper now stands at 51.5%, according to the poll, conducted Aug. 9-10 by Harper Polling. Support for Whatley stands at 39%. The poll has a ±4% margin of error.

High Point University’s latest poll shows much closer results, with 50% of likely voters saying they would vote for Cooper, whereas 45% of said they would vote for Whatley.

“As it is, Cooper’s statement matches the attacks that Whatley’s campaign and supporters have made against him as being soft on crime,” continued Jackson. “While it is not as damaging as the roughly 3,500 criminals Cooper agreed to release early, it can be used as further evidence of a pattern with him.”

In the latest Carolina Journal poll, participants were asked which issue was most important to them in the 2026 election. Only 10.9% of voters cited crime and public safety, down from 11.9% in the May poll.

These poll results align with recent reports documenting a decline in crime across the state. A report from NCDPS divides crime into four major categories, all of which have decreased compared with the same period in 2025. Crime is broken into four categories: property, violent, financial, and drug crime. Property crime has seen the largest decline, at 11.9%, with violent crime down 5.8%, drug crime down 3.2%, and financial crime down 2.1