A far-right Republican candidate running to oversee public schools in North Carolina decried “extreme agendas that threaten our children’s future”, after being confronted by reporters over tweets in which she called for the executions of Barack Obama and Joe Biden.
“Don’t let extreme agendas threaten our children’s future,” Michele Morrow said on social media on Thursday, posting an address in which she said she was “facing the most radical extremist Democrats [that] have ever run for superintendent in the history of North Carolina”.
But Morrow, who is running for superintendent of public instruction, also had to respond to a CNN crew who confronted her about posts, unearthed by the same network, in which she advocated violence against leading Democrats.
Comments made by Morrow between 2019 and 2021 and reported by CNN included a May 2020 tweet in which Morrow said Obama should be the subject of “a pay-per-view of him in front of a firing squad”, adding: “I do not want to waste another dime on supporting his life. We could make some money back from televising his death.”
In December 2020, when Biden, as president-elect, said he would ask Americans to wear masks against Covid-19 for 100 days, Morrow – a nurse – wrote: “Never. We need to follow the constitution’s advice and KILL all TRAITORS!!!”
Other Democrats that Morrow said should be executed, CNN said, included the Minnesota congresswoman Ilhan Omar; the North Carolina governor, Roy Cooper; former New York governor Andrew Cuomo; the former first lady, senator, secretary of state and presidential nominee Hillary Clinton; and the New York senator Chuck Schumer.
Morrow also called for the executions of Anthony Fauci, a senior public health adviser to Donald Trump during the Covid pandemic, and Bill Gates, the Microsoft founder and vaccination campaigner.
She also promoted slogans and claims associated with the QAnon conspiracy theory.
Morrow first responded to the report by saying: “According to [CNN], Obama’s drone attacks on hundreds of innocent Muslims in Yemen are not treasonous. The insanity of the media demonstrates the need to teach K-12 students real history and critical thinking skills.”
Then, on Thursday, CNN played footage of a parking-lot confrontation between Morrow and its correspondent Shimon Prokupecz.
Prokupecz said: “Do you still stand by your comments about former president Barack Obama and that he should be executed, calling for the death of other presidents, do you stand by that?”
Morrow repeatedly said: “No comment.” She also said she was “focused on helping the families of North Carolina, for their children to get quality education, for them to be safe, and for us to be sure that our money is going into the classroom rather than bureaucracies”.
Pressed about her tweets advocating executions of prominent Democrats, Morrow said: “How do you know those are my words?”
Prokupecz said: “Because you tweeted. Are those not your tweets?”
Morrow said she only wanted to “discuss education”.
On Thursday, in video posted to social media, Morrow complained: “Three CNN reporters from New York City have been on my street for the last 48 hours, watching my every move. They’ve been stalking me and my family.”
The North Carolina public school system is responsible for the education of 1.3 million students. Amid proliferating attempts by the Republican right to gain control of public schooling, the North Carolina superintendent race promises to attract national attention.
The Democratic candidate is Mo Green, a former county superintendent and executive director of a foundation focusing on public education.
Morrow, a “lifelong Christian conservative” who homeschools her children, has previously been endorsed by Moms for Liberty, a rightwing pressure group with a national profile. In the Republican primary, she pulled off an upset by defeating the incumbent superintendent.
As reported by local media, Morrow was at the US Capitol on 6 January 2021, when Trump supporters attacked Congress in an attempt to keep Trump in power.
Speaking to the Raleigh News & Observer, she described seeing rioters attempting to break a window and asking them to stop.
“I was frustrated and disgusted when I found people had broken in,” she said. “I felt it was so immature and was not going to solve anything.”
Asked about the January 6 Capitol attack, Morrow recently told Axios: “I won this campaign because of my focus on scholastics … We want to focus on math, reading and science. And I think that’s what North Carolina businesses expect for us to do.”
In her comments on Thursday, Morrow said the CNN crew who confronted her were “trying to interfere in the 2024 election, just like they did in the 2020 election”.
