Michigan’s governor asks: Can North Carolina Democrats turn their state for Biden, too?
Michigan may be a blueprint for Democrats looking to turn the red tide that’s washed over North Carolina’s presidential election results for years and limit Republican control in Raleigh, the midwestern state’s governor says.
Gov. Gretchen Whitmer spoke at a Democratic Women of Mecklenburg County breakfast Monday as part of a swing through North Carolina with President Joe Biden’s reelection campaign. A co-chair of the Biden campaign, the two-term governor has sparked speculation about her own future presidential ambitions.
At Monday’s event, she drew parallels between recent elections in Michigan — where Biden won in 2020 and Democrats took full control of state government for the first time since the 1980s in 2022 — and the state of politics in North Carolina.
“I’m inspired by what I see here in North Carolina,” she said. “It looks very familiar to what I see at home in Michigan. And I know, I can tell you, I can testify: We can win.”
A Democratic presidential candidate hasn’t won the state since 2008, when Barack Obama defeated John McCain, but former President Donald Trump posted his slimmest margin of victory in any state in North Carolina in 2020.
“Coming from a fellow swing state, I recognize how important the state of North Carolina is. I recognize how slim margins are, how hot the rhetoric is and how high the consequences are in this upcoming election,” Whitmer said.
Can Michigan model work for Biden in NC?
Flipping North Carolina in the presidential race, holding onto the governor’s mansion and breaking the Republican supermajority in the state legislature will take a lot of on-the-ground organizing, including going door-to-door, by Democrats, Whitmer said.
“Hardworking people who are trying to get ahead … are so busy that we can’t make any assumptions that everyone can, you know, take in all the information around how high stakes this election is,” she told The Charlotte Observer.
Trump currently leads Biden by 6% in North Carolina, according to FiveThirtyEight’s latest polling average. In addition to the presidential race, Democrats are also trying to hold the governorship, as Josh Stein looks to succeed Gov. Roy Cooper, and break the Republican legislative supermajority the GOP has held since state Rep. Tricia Cotham flipped parties.
Whitmer said she and fellow Michigan Democrats notched wins in part by organizing in traditionally Republican communities.
“We didn’t write off any part of the state because we didn’t write off a single voter, even in the reddest counties. We still showed up,” she said.
Democrats in Michigan swept their state offices and got majorities in both chambers of their state Legislature in 2022, the first time since 1983 the party secured both the Legislature and governorship. Whitmer secured reelection with a margin of victory of almost 11% in the state Biden won in 2020 but Trump took in 2016.
Whitmer also spoke about what she sees as the biggest issues in the election, including abortion. Michigan Democrats’ big gains in 2022 were attributed in part to a referendum on abortion access on the ballot, and North Carolina Democrats are looking to make reproductive health care a key campaign issue in 2024.
“In a state like Michigan and certainly in a state like North Carolina, you’ve got such crucial races at the top of the ticket,” Whitmer said.
