House Speaker Joe Hackney said he did not cut off debate.
At a press conference today, the Chapel Hill Democrat said he personally strived to let the Republican minority have its say on bills.
"The few times debate was cut off these two years, it was a vote of the members of the House to cut it off, which is of course in the rules," he said.
Earlier, House Minority Leader Paul Stam complained about those few times, though he noted that it was much higher under disgraced former Speaker Jim Black. Hackney said he recalled past cutoffs, especially when Republicans were in charge in the late 1990s.
"I know there was one or two years there when debate was cut off a couple hundred times, because I kept count," he said. "I resolved then that if I ever got in a position to do something about it, that I wasn't going to do it that way."
He noted that there were some times when a House Democrat wanted to end debate early and he did not recognize the motion.
"In the last 25 years of cutting off debate, we're in the top one," he said.
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Re: Hackney: I didn't cut off debate
A nation goes down to destruction, TB