RALEIGH, N.C. — North Carolina’s next attorney general will be one of two retiring members of Congress who represented the Charlotte region on Capitol Hill and previously served in the state Legislature.
Both Democratic U.S. Rep. Jeff Jackson and Republican U.S. Rep. Dan Bishop are lawyers and prolific fundraisers. Both have argued that their rival is too radical to become the state’s top law enforcement official on Nov. 5.
The winner will succeed two-term Attorney General Josh Stein, the Democratic candidate for governor. Democrats have dominated the position — no Republican has been elected attorney general since 1896 — even though the GOP has performed well in other statewide races for decades. In both 2016 and 2020, Stein won by fewer than 25,000 votes against his Republican opponent.
Much of this fall’s campaign has focused on who is best able to represent the nation’s ninth-largest state in court and keep its communities safe. Although figures from the State Bureau of Investigation show that North Carolina’s violent crime rate was higher in 2023 than it was a decade ago, it was essentially flat compared to 2022.
The two candidates and their allied PACs were on track to spend at least $31 million combined on television and online advertising during the general election campaign, according to data from AdImpact, which monitors campaign spending. The North Carolina race is one of the most closely watched of the 10 attorney general elections taking place in the US next month.
The attorney general is charged with representing the state in court and defending the work of locally elected district attorneys in criminal appeals. AGs also make legislative recommendations to the General Assembly and have sued specific industries for damages in the past, including tobacco, drug, and social media companies.
That two members of Congress are seeking positions in state government reflects the growing influence of that position and the increasingly a partisan role state attorneys general play when it comes to going to court to support or oppose federal government policies.
Jackson is an Afghan war veteran and National Guard attorney who has gained a strong following on social media and was elected to Congress in 2022. He shared his experience as a prosecutor — working as an assistant district attorney in Gaston County, handling a variety of case types — and his dedication to performing his duties in an impartial matter make him the most qualified candidate.
“It’s essentially about being a shield for people against those who want to do them harm,” Jackson said in a recent interview. “I’ve done that my entire career as a soldier, as a prosecutor. That is why I want to become attorney general.”
Bishop, a longtime commercial litigation attorney, former Mecklenburg County commissioner and state legislator, joined Congress in 2019 and is a strong supporter of Republican presidential candidate and former President Donald Trump.
Bishop downplayed Jackson’s legal history as an assistant prosecutor and emphasized what he calculates as his own more than 400 appearances in state and federal courts.
“What I’ve had is an extensive and complex experience with the legal system in North Carolina,” Bishop said in an interview. “He’s never had a career like this.”
Jackson said if elected, he will work to combat the fentanyl overdose epidemic and combat scammers who are now using artificial intelligence techniques to fool consumers.
Bishop accused Jackson of having “an extensive record of being soft on crime and hostile to police.” He said what North Carolina needs is the “restoration of law and order,” and that he would work to bring in what he sees as liberal-leaning prosecutors who don’t do that.
This position was a springboard for gubernatorial bids; outgoing Governor Roy Cooper served as attorney general for 16 years. In recent years, Cooper and Stein have stopped defending Republican-imposed state laws that they have found to be unconstitutional.
Jackson said in a recent interview that Stein was right to refuse to defend oneself provisions of state laws that restrict medication abortions and determine what a doctor must do before prescribing abortion pills.
But Bishop claims Stein’s motive for not defending state laws enacted by the Republican Party-controlled General Assembly is to advance his political career — and he claimed Jackson would do the same if elected.
Jackson and Bishop served together in the state legislature, where Bishop led a 2016 law which banned cities from enacting new anti-discrimination ordinances and required transgender people to use public restrooms that correspond to the gender on their birth certificate.
Jackson did not stand for re-election to Congress this fall after the General Assembly redrew the legislative maps and placed him in a heavily Republican district.
Jackson and his allies have also pointed to Bishop’s endorsement of Republican Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson as governor, especially after a CNN report alleging Robinson posted explicit racist and sexual messages on the message board of a pornographic website. Robinson has denied the accusation.
When asked if he felt comfortable supporting Robinson, Bishop said he is focused on winning the race for attorney general and that “all issues related to the governor’s race between Mark and the voters lie.” But Jackson said it is “absurd” that Bishop “cannot bring himself to say a single critical word” about Robinson.
Earlier this month, Bishop filed a defamation lawsuit against Jackson’s campaign and others, claiming that at least some of them are responsible for a political survey asking whether a voter is more or less likely to vote for Bishop if he “represents people who stole money from the elderly .” Bishop says he has never represented such people. Jackson’s campaign has suggested the lawsuit will not be successful.