Inside the Party Switch that Blew Up North Carolina Politics (NYTimes) [View all]

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Inside the Party Switch that Blew Up North Carolina Politics

Tricia Cotham, a Democrat who supported abortion rights, was encouraged to run for a state House seat by powerful Republicans. After she was elected, she joined them and delivered a G.O.P. supermajority.

By Kate Kelly and David Perlmutt
Kate Kelly reported from Washington and Raleigh, N.C. David Perlmutt reported from Charlotte and Mint Hill, N.C.

July 30, 2023, 5:00 a.m. ET
When Tricia Cotham, a former Democratic lawmaker, was considering another run for the North Carolina House of Representatives, she turned to a powerful party leader for advice. Then, when she jumped into the Democratic primary, she was encouraged by still other formidable allies.

She won the primary in a redrawn district near Charlotte, and then triumphed in the November general election by 18 percentage points, a victory that helped Democrats lock in enough seats to prevent, by a single vote, a Republican supermajority in the state House.

Except what was unusual — and not publicly known at the time — was that the influential people who had privately encouraged Ms. Cotham to run were Republicans, not Democrats. One was Tim Moore, the redoubtable Republican speaker of the state House. Another was John Bell, the Republican majority leader.

“I encouraged her to run because she was a really good member when she served before,” Mr. Bell recalled in an interview...

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/07/30/us/inside-the-party-switch-that-blew-up-north-carolina-politics.html

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