Merit: For U.S. Sen. Thom Tillis, who says he will vote to oppose President Trump’s declaration of a national emergency that the president has called so he can use money appropriated for other purposes to build a wall on the Mexican border. The North Carolina Republican is the third senator from his party to declare opposition to the emergency measure. It’s unclear if other Senate Republicans will join the dissidents, who so far have enough votes, added to the Democratic opposition, to bring a tie vote. But other Republicans say they’re also considering voting against the president.

The House voted 245-182 Tuesday for legislation that would halt Trump’s bid for billions of dollars to build his long-promised wall. Although the president repeatedly asserts that there’s a dangerous crisis on the Mexican border, the truth is that illegal border crossings are at their lowest level in two decades, that most drugs and human trafficking across the border pass through border checkpoints or through tunnels dug under existing walls and fences, and that most of the would-be immigrants trying to cross the border today are turning themselves in to Border Patrol agents immediately as they seek asylum from violence in their native Central American countries. We may indeed need more walls and fencing on the border, but the situation there today is no national emergency and no reason at all why the president should be empowered to suspend the Constitution’s direction that Congress, not the president, is responsible for appropriations.

In an op-ed column, Tillis wrote that, “It is my responsibility to be a steward of the Article I branch, to preserve the separation of powers and to curb the kind of executive overreach that Congress has allowed to fester for the better part of the past century. I stood by that principle during the Obama administration, and I stand by it now. Conservatives rightfully cried foul when President Barack Obama used executive action to completely bypass Congress and unilaterally provide deferred action to undocumented adults who had knowingly violated the nation’s immigration laws. Some prominent Republicans went so far as to proclaim that Obama was acting more like an ‘emperor’ or ‘king’ than a president.”

He’s right and the president is wrong. We hope the rest of the Senate takes Tillis’ lead.

Demerit: For U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who deliberately distorted what really happened in the 9th Congressional District voting fraud case and, incredibly, tried to pin the blame on Democrats. In an address to his fellow senators on Tuesday, McConnell lambasted Democrats for resisting Republican efforts to curb “voter fraud.” “We were hit with left-wing talking points insisting that voter fraud wasn’t real. That fraud just didn’t happen,” McConnell said. “That modest efforts to ensure that voters are who they say they are and are voting in the proper place were really some sinister right-wing plot. As you might expect, now that an incident of very real voter fraud has become national news and the Republican candidate seems to have benefited, these longstanding Democrat talking points have quieted.”

Good rhetoric, albeit the same sort of “talking points” that Republicans have been using for years now — they sound pretty familiar to North Carolina voters. Trouble is, what McConnell was talking about — the almost nonexistent problem of people voting under someone else’s name — isn’t at all what happened in Bladen and Robeson counties, where a Republican political operative is alleged to have run an extensive “ballot harvesting” operation that illegally handled, filled in or destroyed hundreds of absentee ballots. There was no identity fraud and a voter ID requirement wouldn’t have prevented it.

McConnell is so accustomed to blurting out divisive, partisan babble that he couldn’t even be bothered to check the facts. He should be embarrassed, but he’s probably not. That’s just the way politics is today. A Trumpism defines it best: SAD!

Merit: For the state Division of Motor Vehicles when it holds “REAL ID” days. REAL ID is a new state driver’s license that’s issued after the driver furnishes more extensive proof of identity. Beginning in October 2020, people will need to have a REAL ID or valid U.S. passport for flying, entering federal facilities and visiting military installations. Some military posts already require it. The new, more secure, licenses have a gold star on the front, in the upper-right corner. The extra security is required by the Real ID Act of 2005, which Congress passed in response to the 9/11 terror attacks of 2001.

The DMV says residents can have their REAL ID requests processed in a 20-minute express transaction. The office is not issuing new licenses or renewals that require you take a test. This is only for REAL ID. If you go to a “REAL ID” day, make sure to bring proof of identity and date of birth: Either a certified birth certificate or an unexpired U.S. passport. Proof of Social Security number: Either a Social Security card, a W-2 or 1099 tax form. Proof of name changes (if you had any): Either a certified marriage license, a divorce decree or a court document indicating the name change (this depends on the number of name changes). And two documents for proof of current physical address: Options include a driver’s license, vehicle registration card, voter registration card, utility bill, cable bill and a bank statement.