Our choices in NC’s 13th Congressional District primaries
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Endorsements 2022
The Editorial Board’s recommendations for the primary elections on Tuesday, May 17, 2022.
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North Carolina’s newly drawn 13th Congressional District offers something rare in a time of extreme gerrymandering. It’s a district where both Republican and Democratic candidates have a real chance of winning.
This evenly balanced district mixes urban, suburban and rural voters as it covers Johnston County and parts of Wake, Wayne and Harnett counties. The website FiveThirtyEight rates the district as leaning slightly Republican, but its voting pattern has yet to be tested.
The equal opportunity for both parties in a district without an incumbent has prompted primaries on both sides featuring a total of 13 candidates – eight Republicans and five Democrats. A group that large naturally has some candidates who are nominal and a few who appear well-known and well-funded enough to win the May 17 primary, or be in a July 26 runoff should no candidate receive at least 30 percent of the vote. We are focused here on those who appear to be the leading candidates.
The Republican primary
On paper, former U.S. Rep. Renee Ellmers would appear to be a strong contender. Ellmers, a nurse and Harnett County resident, represented much of this new district from 2011 to 2017. But she lost her 2016 reelection bid and she finished fifth in the 2020 GOP primary for lieutenant governor. She got off to a slow start in this race and her agenda appears to be mostly about her loyalty to former President Donald Trump, despite Trump’s endorsement of one of her rivals in the race, Bo Hines.
Hines, who played football at N.C. State University in 2014 before transferring to Yale, is a newcomer whose hard-right political views are reminiscent of Rep. Madison Cawthorn, without the personal baggage. Hines recently moved into the district from Winston-Salem, but some Johnston County Republicans have complained that he’s an interloper without true ties to the area.
Kent Keirsey touts his Army experience as a combat veteran and as a businessman. He says he has no interest in becoming a career politician, but sees serving in Congress as a limited “tour of duty.” He is another hardline conservative.
Kelly Daughtry, the daughter of longtime Republican state lawmaker Leo Daughtry, is a Johnston County lawyer who would appear to be the Republicans’ most electable candidate in a general election, though she has veered rightward in the primary contest. She did not respond to requests to meet with the Editorial Board.
We make no recommendation in this race.
The Democratic Primary
The five-way race for the Democratic nomination appears to be down to two candidates, state Sen. Wiley Nickel and former state Sen. Sam Searcy. Among the three others, Jamie Bowles did not interview with the Editorial Board and Denton Lee seems a reluctant Democrat who would prefer to run as an independent. Nathan Click, a U.S. Air Force veteran and businessman, is an appealing candidate who rightly sees threats to democracy as the nation’s most pressing problem.
Searcy, a former N.C. senator who serves on the state Board of Community Colleges, argues that his rural background and moderate politics make him the Democrat with the best chance of winning this rural-suburban district.
Nickel, a two-term state senator from Cary who did advance work for former President Barack Obama, has carefully laid the groundwork for his own run for Congress. “To win a fifty-fifty district like this, you’ve got to be willing just work and go to every corner of the district, and that’s what we’ve done,” he said.
As a state senator has pressed an almost hopeless effort to restore unemployment insurance benefits that Republicans slashed in 2013. He supports abortion rights, tighter controls on gun sales, legalized marijuana, Medicaid expansion, higher taxes on corporations, a $15 minimum wage and limits on gerrymandering.
“You’ve got to give people a reason to vote and that’s what I’ve done,” Nickel said.
The Republicans in this primary are taking strong conservative stands. Nickel offers a strong liberal response. We recommend Wiley Nickel.
BEHIND THE STORY
MOREHow we do our endorsements
Members of the combined Charlotte Observer and Raleigh News & Observer editorial boards are conducting interviews and research of candidates in municipal and state elections. The combined board is led by N.C. Opinion Editor Peter St. Onge, who is joined in Raleigh by deputy Opinion editor Ned Barnett and in Charlotte by deputy Opinion editor Paige Masten. Board members also include Observer editor Rana Cash and News & Observer editor Nicole Stockdale.
The editorial board also talks with others who know the candidates and have worked with them. When we’ve completed our interviews and research, we discuss each race and decide on our endorsements.
This story was originally published May 3, 2022 at 4:30 AM.