For some of NC’s most engaged voters, emotions run high ahead of election
Annalicia Pickering, a pediatrics resident at Duke, had done some phone-banking for Barack Obama, but she had never gone door-to-door canvassing for a candidate before.
Neither had her husband, Josh, a medical student at Stanford taking a year off. And neither had their lab-golden puppy Cooper, not named for the governor.
All three were at an office park in Durham on Monday to pick up materials to canvass for Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden and listen to a pep talk from state treasurer candidate Ronnie Chatterji, their emotions piqued ahead of Tuesday’s election.
“I’m cautiously optimistic,” Annalicia Pickering said.
“We’re all feeling some whiplash from 2016,” Josh Pickering said, “but very excited to see what tomorrow holds.”
In Fayetteville, Cody and Danielle Petrella, along with their three young children and neighbor, Mary Frimml, came to the airport on a frigid fall morning to see President Donald Trump.
“There’s some pretty dividing things happening, and it’s fun to show your support,” Danielle Petrella said.
North Carolina could potentially tip the balance both in the presidential race and the Senate, and that prospect was enough to motivate some of the most dedicated voters to attend a campaign rally or walk the streets on a frigid morning the day before the election.
“It’s stressful living in a swing state,” Shelagh Kenney said, “because it’s all happening here.”
Kenney, a Durham resident, was picking up materials to canvass for the Biden-Harris campaign, knocking on doors of likely Democratic voters. So was David Goodman, a retired pharmaceutical researcher who said he had gotten involved in politics for the first time this election because of, in his words, “this ridiculous president.”
“I just think we’re very much on the wrong track,” Goodman said. “Four more years is far beyond enough of disregarding science. Look at COVID. That was just horribly managed. We’ve just got poor leadership. And we’ve got an immoral president that needs out. People are coming together, but we’re such a divided country. I just hope that logic and science will prevail.”
In Fayetteville, the president’s rally drew voters like Luther Sanchez, 42, of Fayetteville, who cast his ballot early and in-person.
Sanchez said he voted for Trump in 2016 because his policies align with his own “moral and Christian beliefs.”
“I own a tax firm, so I see the tax side of things,” Sanchez said. “I see the improvement that things have been made. I’m for the people, and I believe at heart, he is too.”
Sanchez said he doesn’t agree with everything the president has done during his time in office but “it comes with the territory.”
No matter who wins, Sanchez said, he’s hoping the country will come to terms with it.
“I pray that there will be peace all across the nation, that there won’t be any more looting or rioting or anything of that nature from either side,” Sanchez said. “I just hope that everybody can find peace and we can move forward together. No matter the outcome.”
That was a common thread in Durham, where volunteers spoke of their concerns about “legal bickering” and “discord’ in a potentially disputed election.
Andy Knapp, who spent two decades as a physician at Duke but now lives in California, was back Monday to canvass for Biden. His daughter and granddaughter live in Durham, and he said he still cares deeply about North Carolina and felt his efforts would be better spent here.
“I hate to use the ‘O word’ and say I’m optimistic, but I’m somewhere between hopeful and optimistic,” Knapp said. “My dream would be that things would be settled in time to have champagne by midnight on Wednesday, but we shall see.”
Democrats found no security in Biden’s lead in the polls, especially after 2016. “Honestly, four more years of Donald Trump is my biggest fear,” said Carol Bouchner, a Durham resident who works in government relations for a mortgage insurer.
At the Trump rally, Cody Petrella, who works in law enforcement, said he doesn’t agree with everything Trump says or does, but he voted for the president because he’s “a businessman and nobody owns him.”
Cody and Danielle Petrella have not cast their ballot yet, but plan on voting on Election Day.
“He stands with the working person,” Frimml, their neighbor, said. “My mother and father were farmers, and he really works with the farmers.”
Larry and Gloria King, of Rutherfordton, said they have been to 10 to 12 of Trump’s rallies. They cast their ballots early and in person.
Ahead of the 2016 primary election, Larry King said, the couple had been praying about who they should support.
“God told us, we believe, that we need to vote for Donald Trump,” Larry King, 73, said.
The Kings said they had previously been invited onstage at a Trump rally, and they were also invited to participate in a round-table discussion with other Black Americans in Charlotte.
“The question he asked us was ‘What do Black Americans want from me as president?” Gloria King, 71, said. “Together, we came up with a whole list of things ... And that day, he was very attentive, very compassionate. He listened. And we have been on board the Trump train ever since.”
Everything they addressed in that discussion, the Kings said, Trump has tackled, including prison reform, vocational education, funding for historically Black colleges and universities and pro-life issues.
For Kenney, an attorney, health care, climate change and the COVID-19 response are all on the ballot.
“I know how much this election means, both to me, to my family, to my community, and to my nation,” Kenney said. “I have such big visions as to what could happen with a change. A recognition of climate change. Public health and safety.”
Kenney and other Biden supporters also talked about the energy they saw surrounding this election, with its record early voting turnout and the unusual youth of many campaign volunteers. That included the Pickerings. And their dog.
“I remember where I was the day that Trump got elected and where I was the day after and feeling so hopeless,” Annalicia Pickering said. “And then seeing everyone else, so much energy with the protests back then, the women’s march, and then fast forwarding up to now and that energy hasn’t gone away.
And I think that’s really cool. I’m feeling really inspired, too, by how many young people have gotten out to vote already, I think that’s pretty exciting. And just the number of early voters, period. So still cautious, but still optimistic.”
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This story was originally published November 2, 2020 at 3:36 PM.
