Today, with the House of Representatives adjourned, marks the end of my three terms as your representative for NC District 105. I’m proud to have been the very first Democrat to represent this district in the history of our state, and I know I won’t be the last. In a lot of ways, this is a bittersweet moment for me, but I’m looking forward with a full heart and clear eyes as I figure out what’s next.
I grew up in rural North Carolina, and everything that I am is because I was born here, in this state. Everything that I am, I owe to my colleagues in the legislature, to the people who’ve sat in those halls before me and who made the decision to give a kid like me a chance.
That’s what’s so incredible about our state: it doesn’t matter who you are or where you’re from. I had a state that believed in me, and that let me rise above and reach my potential. It’s been the honor of my life serving over the last six years (I’m not married and I don’t have kids, so I can still say it’s the honor of my life without offending anyone 😉). I’m going to miss it, even if I’m not out of this fight.
I especially want to say thank you to the people of Charlotte, who have given me the opportunity to serve. And I hope I have made you proud.
Here’s a story: I grew up an hour and a half northwest of the city of Charlotte, which made it the center of the universe for us. Our news came in from Charlotte, our weather reports came from Charlotte, and everything interesting that ever seemed to happen was there. It was the metropolis. The city on a hill.
The first time I went there was in kindergarten, and I remember looking up and seeing my first skyscraper. I could scarcely believe that buildings could be so tall. Surely that meant this was the greatest city in the world.
So I spent literally my entire adult life trying to get to Charlotte, and in 2016, I finally made it. An election had just happened—you probably remember that one—and I’d always been interested in politics, and I said, “Okay, well, if there’s ever a time to do something, it’s now.”
So I went home to my parents, I told them I was thinking about running for office, and my mom said, “No one knows who the hell you are.”
And I said, you’re not wrong, but hear me out.
I ended up getting lucky, because in 2018, the Democratic Party literally could not find another human being willing to run for that seat. I was able to jump at the opportunity, and I have had the most incredible time of my life since. This has been the best job of my life. It’s also been the most frustrating job of my life—and hell, a lot of that was just dealing with my fellow Democrats.
But that’s what democracy is. It’s messy.
If you’ve ever tied a bow tie, you know how you get to a point where you feel like you know you’ve been doing it right, but everything gets all messed up, and you start doubting yourself and thinking you can’t be doing this right? But you just keep pulling, and sure enough, it works. And that’s what democracy is, too. It’s frustrating. It’s irritating. It’s anger inducing. But doggone it, it works when you just keep pulling.
Losing sucks, but getting to travel to every corner of this state made me fall even more in love with North Carolina that I already had, which I didn’t think was possible. It gave me the chance to really see how we are all connected, and while we have some cultural differences, we all have the same dreams of a better life and the same basic needs. But when one political party refuses to fulfill those needs, it’s absolutely critical we do whatever it takes to create true political competition in every corner of this state so that both parties have to work for the people. Without electoral accountability our whole system fails, and it’s up to us to fix it.
And that’s why North Carolina is such a special place, because there’s truly no state like us. We’re the perfect microcosm of this country. We’ve got the largest rural population in the nation aside from Texas. And unlike places like Georgia or Virginia, our urban population is spread out across a bunch of different cities instead of being concentrated in one or two metro areas. We’re a true purple state, and so to get anything done, we have to be able to come together if we want to truly serve our people.
And if we're able to do that, and I know I've said this so many times, if we're able to do that and show people how that works in North Carolina, that's the template for making our democracy work all across America. If we can do it here, we can do it anywhere, because no state has dealt with the challenges North Carolina has. We just have to remember to always invest in our people and invest in our future.
I’m still not sure what comes next, just that I know I’ll still be around. At the end of the day, our government can and must be a force for good, and it does so by investing in our people. That’s a fight I will never give up. Thank you so much for allowing me to serve and for believing in me every step of the way. I know our best years are yet to come, and I may not be serving you in elected office, but I will never give up this fight.
