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    • Trump won the White House, but MAGA did not dominate North Carolina. GOOD
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    Trump won the White House, but MAGA did not dominate North Carolina. GOOD

    Pabio Posted on

    Attending Kamala Harris’ rally in Charlotte, North Carolina, gave me some hope. Watching Democrats hold on to the governorship has kept that hope alive.

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    North Carolina I had a weird election night.

    Donald Trump won the state by nearly 190,000 votes – the biggest margin he won in North Carolina over the last three presidential elections.

    Meanwhile, the state elected Democrat Josh Stein as governor with almost 55% of the votes and beat a MAGA candidate in the process.

    The State The Supreme Court could move further to the rightbut the Democrats have broken the Republican qualified majority in the State House of Representatives. The Republicans won the Headquarters of the auditorwhile the Democrats won state superintendent.

    Over the past year, I’ve told countless people that I think North Carolina will turn red again on election night. What I have observed in my state is a persistent Republican presence and support for the MAGA agenda.

    North Carolina voters continue to elude me, but one thing is certain: The gains the Democratic Party has made in the state give me hope for the party’s future.

    Asheville voted despite lack of drinking water after Hélène

    In the days leading up to the election, I drove across North Carolina to get a sense of how the state would vote.

    The Friday before Election Day, I traveled to Asheville, where residents still live without clean water. There, I saw Democratic voters turning out in droves to vote early despite the recent devastation caused by Hurricane Helene. While much of North Carolina has moved further to the right compared to 2020, many counties in western North Carolina have moved further to the left.

    One polling station I visited also served as a drinking water station, a place to get hot meals, and a place to drop off donations. I spoke to Democratic volunteer Sherry Banner, who said the storm did not influence her decision to campaign for the party.

    “My decision came as we got closer and closer to the election,” Banner told me. “I’m more and more afraid of what might happen if things don’t go the way I want them to.”

    Notice: Voters rejected the qualified candidate. Can we ever have a female president?

    At another site, local Democrats had signs for people to pose that read “Cookie Lovers Against Bigotry” and “Louder Than Storms, Louder Than Hate.”

    “Asheville has strong political beliefs,” voter EJ Wright told me outside the East Asheville Library. “It doesn’t matter if there were still floodwaters here, I think people would still be here trying to vote.”

    Harris’ rally in Charlotte was my moment of hope

    The next day, I traveled to Charlotte to hear Vice President Kamala Harris speak. The PNC Music Pavilion was filled with thousands of Harris supporters. Just down the street in Greensboro, Trump spoke to a sparse arena that Harris had previously filled.

    After spending an afternoon with Harris supporters, I assumed that North Carolina had a chance of going blue this election cycle. It was an ambitious goal, but a real possibility given that Stein was well ahead of scandal-plagued Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson. I assumed, incorrectly, that there was no way to have that many split-ballot voters.

    Spending election night with Democrats in a battleground state

    On election night, I was in Raleigh at the North Carolina Democrats’ watchdog party, where State Council candidates were awaiting results. Early in the night we found out that Stein had defeated Robinson. In fact, S.Tein received 160,000 more votes in the state than Trump.

    “We chose hope over hatred, competence over chaos, decency over division. » the governor-elect told the crowd at the North Carolina Democrats’ watch party. “This is who we are as North Carolina.”

    Notice: You can’t imagine it. Republicans have been weird about women for years.

    The night quickly took a turn from there.

    There were some victories for the Democrats: Representative Jeff Jackson was elected state attorney general against Republican Dan Bishop; Mauritius (Mo) Green defeated right-wing extremist Michele Morrow in the race for state superintendent of public education and Rachel Hunt defeated Hal Weatherman in the race for lieutenant governor, handing the position to Democrats for the first time in 16 years.

    They also broke the Republican supermajority in the General Assembly, meaning Stein will have the power to veto any extremism passed by the legislature. That’s a relief compared to Robinson, an ultra-MAGA offensive candidate who would have set the state back a generation.

    The reality is that North Carolina is still for Trump

    I’m not surprised Harris lost North Carolina. Although I’ve seen him make progress in the bluer parts of the state, Trump still has a stronghold in rural areas.

    In Mount Airy, my rural hometown, I saw countless Trump signs on lawns. He won 76% of the vote in the county.

    On the other hand, I hope people don’t take the opportunity to view the South as deserving of what comes next. There are people in every part of the country who believe in the values ​​Harris stands for. Even in my conservative hometown, I spoke with a woman at the grocery store who told me that abortion rights were her biggest concern.

    Ultimately, I’m pleased that North Carolina Democrats had overall successes on an otherwise disappointing night. I hope the party builds momentum in the future and continues to try to reach voters in all parts of the state – not just its blue cities.

    Follow USA TODAY election columnist Sara Pequeño on X, formerly Twitter, @sara__pequeno

    Pabio
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