Now-unaffiliated NC Rep. Carla Cunningham wants to stick to legislation, not party
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- Rep. Carla Cunningham changed party affiliation to unaffiliated after losing her primary.
- Cunningham said she will focus on legislative work and safety act, not caucus.
- Cunningham and Rep. Nasif Majeed are two unaffiliated lawmakers whose votes draw scrutiny.
A North Carolina House Democrat who changed her party affiliation does not want to talk about caucus, but rather focus on “getting things done.”
Rep. Carla Cunningham, who is now unaffiliated, spoke to reporters in the press corps at the Legislative Building for the first time on Wednesday since dropping her Democratic status after losing her primary.
But before Cunningham spoke at the microphone, the spokesperson for Republican House Speaker Destin Hall, Demi Dowdy, told reporters that Cunningham would take questions only about a bill.
Cunningham was joined by a few Republicans and a few Democrats to talk about the Dominique Moody Safety Act, a bill named for a 6-year-old Mecklenburg County girl who died after being severely abused. The bill would create a Child Welfare Case Escalation Team within the state’s social services department, The Charlotte Observer previously reported.
Asked what the bipartisan bill means for her plans for the legislative session and working with Republicans and Democrats, she said “I think we ought to operate like that all the time, I really do.”
“Because you can get things done. When you’re carrying on with each other all the time, that’s a distraction. That keeps you from getting to the solution,” Cunningham said.
Cunningham also sent out a news release last week asking reporters to stop asking her about if she’ll go to caucus meetings with Republicans.
“I decided to offer to help with this, just in case she needed help fielding questions from the press,” Dowdy told The News & Observer. “And she also let me know that she preferred not to answer questions about her party change at all, and so I offered to just run interference there and let the press know ahead of her press conference,” she said.
Dowdy referred questions about Cunningham attending Republican caucus meetings to lawmakers.
Rep. Allen Chesser, a Nash County Republican who is a co-sponsor on Cunningham’s child welfare bill, declined to talk about caucus meetings. He said bipartisan news conferences show the importance of the issue they were focused on, and noted he has co-sponsored legislation in the past across the aisle.
Cunningham was primaried by Democrats
Cunningham was “primaried” in March — meaning that her own political party supported someone challenging a sitting lawmaker — after voting with Republicans to override an immigration bill and giving a controversial speech about assimilation. Her speech drew a rebuke from fellow Democrats. Even Democratic Gov. Josh Stein got involved in the race, endorsing her opponent Rodney Sadler, who defeated her. Stein acknowledged to The News & Observer in April that Cunningham might be mad at him and other Democrats over it.
Questions have been swirling about whether Cunningham would caucus — join party meetings at the legislature — with Democrats or join Republicans.
Rep. Nasif Majeed also changed his party affiliation from Democrat to unaffiliated after losing his primary. Majeed told The News & Observer that he had not decided about going to caucus meetings for Democrats or Republicans.
Majeed and Cunningham are now the only two unaffiliated lawmakers in the General Assembly. Republicans are one vote short of a veto-proof supermajority, so how Majeed and Cunningham vote this session is under intense scrutiny.
This story was originally published May 6, 2026 at 2:56 PM with the headline "Now-unaffiliated NC Rep. Carla Cunningham wants to stick to legislation, not party."
