NC Democrat says his party is treating him the ‘exact same’ as it did Tricia Cotham
State Rep. Cecil Brockman, facing criticism from other Democrats for missing a major vote last week, said he is being “scapegoated” and treated the same way Rep. Tricia Cotham was before she switched parties last year.
In a statement Monday, Brockman said he was sick during the vote and “prioritized my health” since he had received word that Republicans had the votes to pass a bill that shifts power in state government.
Brockman said his party has continued to “prioritize attacking me and spreading lies within my community,” and said his supporters in the High Point-area district he’s represented since 2015 “need to know that this is a coordinated strategy from within my party and it will continue over the next two years.”
He said that after narrowly winning a tough primary earlier this year, in which his opponent was endorsed by youth leaders in the party over Brockman’s absences and record of voting with Republicans on a number of bills, the N.C. Democratic Party “clearly still does not respect the will of the voters in District 60, who made their voices clear about who they want to be their representative.”
Asked on Monday if he plans to stay in the party during next year’s legislative session, Brockman told The News & Observer in a text message that he has been a “lifelong Democrat,” and that instead of “fighting other Democrats, I would rather see our party focus on doing things a successful one does to win back the majority.”
When asked if he had ruled out switching parties entirely, Brockman said: “I would just say that this is the exact same behavior that pushed Tricia Cotham out of our party. Everyone has their limits.”
Cotham’s decision to leave the Democratic Party last year and join the GOP secured the last seat Republicans needed to be able to override the governor’s vetoes. Since then, Republicans have overridden more than two dozen of Gov. Roy Cooper’s vetoes.
At the time, Brockman shot down speculation that he was planning to switch as well, telling The N&O that he had been in the party his entire life, and planned to stay and help Democrats win more elections.
The GOP came up one vote short of a supermajority in the November election. So the party can no longer count on overriding the Democratic governor’s vetoes — unless it can persuade at least one House Democrat to either vote with Republicans or switch parties altogether.
Asked about Brockman’s statement on the party and its leadership, a spokesperson for House Democratic Leader Robert Reives declined to comment.
N.C. GOP spokesperson Matt Mercer, responding to the statement on X, said it was “another devastating indictment” of the party’s leadership.
Tensions among House Democrats over Brockman
Brockman’s harsh criticism for his party and its leaders on Monday was the latest in a back-and-forth within the party that began after he missed an override vote last week on sweeping GOP legislation that takes away power from incoming Gov. Josh Stein and other recently elected Democrats.
Fellow Democratic Reps. Pricey Harrison and Tracy Clark criticized Brockman for being absent.
Harrison, a 20-year veteran of the House, told The News and Record of Greensboro she felt Brockman’s constituents were owed an explanation for his absences, which she said have been “frustrating” for the Democratic caucus.
Clark, who was appointed to replace Rep. Ashton Wheeler Clemmons in August, and was elected to a full two-year term last month, told The News and Record on Thursday Brockman’s absence was “extremely frustrating because he’s not a Democrat,” adding that Democrats can’t “trust or hold him accountable for being with us on important votes like the one we had yesterday.”
Ahead of the vote Wednesday, Democrats and opponents of the bill were watching to see if any of the three House Republicans from Western North Carolina who had initially voted against the bill would defy their party and vote to sustain Gov. Roy Cooper’s veto as well.
Ultimately, all three Republicans voted with the rest of their caucus to defeat Cooper’s veto, which meant that absences among Democrats wouldn’t have made a difference in the GOP’s ability to enact the bill. Another Democrat who was absent, Rep. Joe John of Raleigh, announced after the vote that he had recently been diagnosed with throat cancer, and missed the vote because of his treatment.
Responding to Harrison and Clark on Friday, Brockman said his constituents “are better served by a representative who has worked hard to secure millions of dollars in state funds which has not ever been seen before in my district,” as opposed to lawmakers like Harrison, who he said “has prioritized talk over action and resources for the constituents who elected her.”
Earlier this year, Brockman told The News & Observer he had struggled with his mental health, and suffered a mental breakdown last year. He said he previously didn’t speak about it publicly because he didn’t want it to seem like “an excuse.”
In that interview in April, he said that after serving a few terms in the legislature, he realized that his district wouldn’t receive any help unless he sought funding from the party in power.
Defending his record last week, Brockman said that despite his absences, he has “gotten more done for my poor Black community by prioritizing them, my constituency, over divisive party politics.”
Addressing Harrison and Clark in his statement Friday, Brockman said his recommendation to both of them “is that they remain in their own lanes.”
“Your choice to do nothing to assist your constituency and their everyday needs in favor of playing political games will continue to have negative effects on your districts,” he said. “Just like nationally, now more than ever before, our communities need leaders not bullies whose nasty behavior is party-endorsed and ripples out tenfold.”
Harrison and Clark respond to Brockman
Responding to Brockman on Monday, Harrison told The N&O that while she recognizes that his “deal making to bring money home for his local community is a win for him, I believe it comes at the expense of North Carolina as a whole.”
“I have spent my entire legislative career fighting for our democracy, a clean environment, strong public schools, gun safety, criminal justice reform, equality, and many other issues that serve not just my local community, but the greater good,” Harrison said in a text message.
“Good government shouldn’t set elected representatives up to compete with each other for resources,” she said. “In a state with as much to offer as North Carolina, every district should be reaping the benefits.”
Clark, meanwhile, told The N&O she doesn’t consider herself a bully, and said she thinks “everyone has a right to hold each other accountable and that transparency is critical in our roles as elected officials.”
She said she “personally received hundreds of emails and calls from my constituents asking me to sustain the veto.”
“I can’t imagine missing that vote and not representing their wishes,” Clark said. “I hope Rep. Brockman is present for more votes next term.”
Brockman also brought up Clark’s appointment in August. Brockman, who is Black, said that Clark, who is white, “was given her position without a free and fair primary which disenfranchised Black voters and Black leadership here in Guilford County.”
Clark told the Greensboro News & Record that a review of her appointment found no violations in the process, and said Brockman was “rehashing unsubstantiated claims.”
This story was originally published December 16, 2024 at 3:36 PM.
