A Republican hasn’t been elected as North Carolina’s attorney general in more than 100 years.
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Cooper formally announced his bid Monday evening to a crowd of party luminaries, interest group leaders and friends and family in Nash County, where he grew up and began his law practice.
“It’s time for a governor who measures our state by the success of regular working folks”, Cooper said at Nash Community College.
With longstanding ties to North Carolina and the Democratic establishment, Cooper, 58, could be a formidable candidate. Monday morning, Spaulding said in a statement that “this will be a meaningful primary”. Cooper has been state government’s highest ranking Democrat since Republican Pat McCrory became governor in 2013.
“My stepmother is in public education, and we’ve really felt the impact of the policies of Gov. McCrory and the state legislature for far too long – to think that we can’t do something to change this is ridiculous”, he said.
“Our commitment to an education system that lifts incomes and provides opportunities for everyone should be unwavering and unmatched”, said Cooper.
“I think a few of the initiatives and ideas we’ve implemented here successfully in Forsyth County could be used across the state”, said O’Neill. “North Carolina is better than this”, he said.
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Republicans and social conservatives have been unhappy with Cooper’s decision to stop defending North Carolina’s constitutional ban on gay marriage after a federal appeals court struck down Virginia’s similar prohibition.
