As Charlotte, Raleigh suburbs trend bluer, opportunities emerge for NC Democrats | Opinion
In 2018, several state House and Senate districts in the once-ruby red suburbs of Charlotte flipped blue.
It helped Democrats break through the GOP supermajority in the North Carolina General Assembly — and while Republicans have managed to claw back ground in some areas, the urban suburbs of Wake and Mecklenburg counties have only gotten more competitive.
It’s part of a nationwide trend. In Georgia, for example, the growing suburbs outside Atlanta have put the state in play for Democrats. While the suburbs of Raleigh and Charlotte don’t represent nearly as large a share of the statewide vote, the changing politics of those areas remain interesting nonetheless.
“Urban suburbs have been trending from what I would say are very strong Republican areas into highly competitive areas,” said Michael Bitzer, a political scientist who teaches at Catawba College. “And I see no reason to doubt that it won’t continue to be competitive, if not move potentially more Democratic, in upcoming election cycles.”
The changing suburbs have given Democrats new faces that could soon become known across the state. Once upon a time, it would have been surprising to see a Democratic legislator from south Charlotte making a run for statewide office. In 2024, there will be at least two on the ballot.
Wesley Harris, who represents the Ballantyne area in the state House, recently launched a campaign for state treasurer. He’s seeking to replace Republican incumbent Dale Folwell, who is rumored to be considering a run for governor. Rachel Hunt, who served two terms in the N.C. House before becoming a state senator, announced a bid for lieutenant governor earlier this month.
Harris and Hunt both flipped red seats in 2018, with Harris defeating former state Rep. Scott Stone and Hunt unseating longtime incumbent Bill Brawley. The districts they represent now are about as competitive as it gets in Charlotte — which isn’t all that much anymore. Even in a cycle that favors Republicans, as 2022 did, both Harris and Hunt won their elections handily, even outperforming U.S. Senate candidate Cheri Beasley in most precincts.
Now, in their respective quests for statewide office, both candidates are defining themselves as an antidote to the Republican politics of extremism. Harris critiques the investments and opportunities not taken under GOP leadership, while Hunt is drawing a sharp contrast between herself and current Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson, who regularly draws negative attention for his inflammatory rhetoric and disparaging comments about women and LGBTQ+ people.
That’s a strategy that served North Carolina Democrats — including Hunt and Harris — well when they successfully broke the supermajority in 2018. It’s also one that’s resonated with suburban voters across the country since Donald Trump’s election in 2016. The increasingly extreme wing of the Republican Party has alienated suburban voters who tend to be more moderate, particularly in battleground states.
“When Trump got elected, they saw that the party was even shifting further to the right, just picking culture wars,” Harris said. “We spoke to that in 2018, and that’s really what helped shift the suburbs.”
Said Bitzer: “What the Republican Party has gone through over the past several years is very much a distinct belief shift. And maybe that is having an impact and effect to where people now are slowly realigning their voting patterns as opposed to 20 years ago.”
It helps, too, that suburban areas have grown younger and more diverse with time. The Charlotte area is among the fastest-growing regions in North Carolina, and communities of color are growing faster than the white population in Mecklenburg County, Axios Charlotte reported in 2021.
Today, Wake and Mecklenburg counties just have one Republican apiece representing them in the state legislature. Local elected bodies have become heavily Democratic, relegating Republicans to a tiny minority on city councils and county commissions.
“We’re seeing fairly clearly that these urban suburbs are indeed the battlegrounds, but everything else in the state is so lopsided to one party over the other,” Bitzer said. “People need to pay attention to, I think, where the trends are playing themselves out.”
Paige Masten is a Charlotte-based opinion writer and member of the Editorial Board.
