NEW HANOVER COUNTY — New Hanover County voters elected two new Democrats to the North Carolina General Assembly and reelected another as part of the “blue wave” that swept the country in Tuesday’s election.
In the Senate District 7, Jessica Bichler currently has 52.64% of the vote compared to incumbent Republican Michael Lee’s 47.36% based on preliminary results.
Over in the House of Representatives, Democrat incumbent Deb Butler fended off a challenge from Republican Latisha Grady for the District 18 seat, securing 70.42% of votes. In District 20, Democratic school board member Tim Merrick has a narrow lead over Republican Dane Scalise to take over retiring Republican Ted Davis’ seat.
Scalise only trails Merrick by 101 votes. The board of elections still has more than 1,000 provisional ballots to review, which could sway the unofficial results if the ballots are valid and applicable to District 20.
The race is also eligible for a recount, though the New Hanover County Board of Elections confirmed Scalise had not filed as of Nov. 4. Scalise, who chose not to speak with Port City Daily about the election results, has until Nov. 16 to ask for a recount.
The shakeups in New Hanover County contributed to flipping the House to Democratic control; this doesn’t include the southern portion of the county encompassing Carolina Beach and Kure Beach, covered by Republican Rep. Charlie Miller.
Democrats also managed to take four seats in the Senate, with another Senate contest too close to call, ending the Republicans’ supermajority in the chamber.
Now, attention shifts to who the new leaders will be in each chamber. Democrats will need to choose a new House speaker, while Senate Republicans will soon be without a president pro tempore; Phil Berger lost his primary earlier this year, with majority leader Sen. Lee currently holding the position. Lee was rumored to be in consideration for Senate president pro tempore. He did not respond to Port City Daily for an interview request post-election.
Butler told Port City Daily Thursday she expects House Minority Leader Robert Rieves, a Chatham County representative who has been in office since 2021, to be elected House speaker; however, she hopes, as a senior member of the caucus, she will be awarded a leadership position using her finance expertise.
“I have told our leader that I think he should hand out the chairmanships based on meritocracy, and I think in the end I’ve done the work and done the learning, and I hope I’ll be in a position for leadership in at least one or two very significant committees,” Butler said.
Butler said she is optimistic about working with new leadership in the Senate.
According to the Carolina Journal, Sen. Brent Jackson — who represents several counties including Pender and did not face a challenger this year — has asked Republicans to appoint him president pro tempore; he did not respond to Port City Daily’s interview request.
The journal also indicated Deputy President Pro Tempore Ralph Hise from Mitchell County and Sen. Todd Johnson from Union County have expressed interest in the position. The News and Observer has reported Sen. Jim Burgin, who narrowly won a fifth term to his seat representing Harnett, Lee and Sampson counties, has requested consideration.
“I hope that there will be more opportunity to work together and more reasonable heads prevail for the better of North Carolina rather than this culture war clash we seem to have fallen prey to,” Butler said.
In Senate District 7, Bichler said she thinks the Republicans’ loss of a supermajority would bode well for increased bipartisan cooperation. She told Port City Daily she’s spoken with many people who were not planning to vote for her and were able to reach common ground. When Port City Daily asked on what issues, Bichler cited an example of ensuring citizens had basic needs cared for.
“If someone is hungry let’s find a way that they can eat,” she said.
Most of New Hanover County — Brunswick County Sen. Bill Rabon controls the “Wilmington notch” carving out some of downtown — is now set to be represented by a new voice without and has no prior political experience. She owns a yoga studio who said she wanted to run for Lee’s seat because she believed the current administration was not doing enough to help working families.
Bichler told Port City Daily her advantage is the lack of “political baggage” she carries into office and a platform capitalizing on important issues that Lee has taken flak for, such as holding PFAS polluters accountable.
Activists went after this issue during the election season, as seen with Clean Politics, Clean Water’s controversial ads commenting on Lee’s water quality record, including signs saying “Mike Lee’s special interest special. Polluters get away with it! Now you pay to drink your water!” There are also cardboard cutouts of Lee in an “I ♥ Special Interest” t-shirt holding a pile of money in one hand and a water bottle labeled “tapped out spring” in the other. The cutout portrays Lee as having wet himself.
Though Bichler, too, was also the target of attack ads from Lee’s campaign, including an AI rendering of her doing yoga and the publishing of an excerpt from her 2011 academic thesis, which Lee’s campaign called “anti-American.”
“There were some dirty politics that really offended a lot of people in our community and I think that won over people to want to support and back me,” Bichler said.
However, it also helped give her name recognition. The AI ads were picked up by national outlets like NPR and The New Yorker.
Though Lee did not respond to Port City Daily’s repeated interview requests, on Wednesday he posted a statement online wishing Bichler well:
“My term continues through the end of the year, and I will keep working for the people of this district until the last day. Wilmington has been my home for a long time, and it will remain so. I look forward to continuing to serve this community in new ways,” he wrote.
Bichler said Lee reached out to her after the results came in Tuesday, congratulating her and offering to answer any questions she had as she moved into her new role. Bichler said Lee’s offer may come in handy when contemplating the new constitutional amendments that passed on Tuesday’s ballot.
Per the passage, the state constitution mandates personal and corporate income taxes at 3.5%, as compared to the current 7% cap.
Another amendment allowed the General Assembly to limit local governments’ ability to raise property taxes, though how exactly this will work and what percentage increase will be allowed has yet to be worked out.
Both Bichler, Butler and Merrick told Port City Daily they did not favor hamstringing local elected leaders’ ability to make budgetary decisions. Port City Daily asked Butler if the passage of the constitutional amendment required the General Assembly to pass legislation outlining how the property tax increase cap should function; Butler said she wasn’t sure if the amendment could lay “fallow” and the General Assembly would need to discuss how to move it forward.
If granted a prominent financial position — such as chairperson of the House’s finance or appropriations committees — Butler said she wants to craft a budget that is “fair, transparent, and delivered on time,” alluding to Republicans control of the budget in the last few cycles and their failure to pass one for a year and a half past deadline.
Butler aimed to pass a constitutional amendment this year requiring legislators to pass a budget by June 30 or forfeit their pay. It died in the rules committee. She said at candidates’ forum hosted by PCD, WECT and WHQR this year she would revive the effort and noted her bill would require a public hearing on the budget public and five days for legislators to be able to review the budget.
When it comes to affordability and the economy — which voters across the country and in North Carolina cited as a top issue — Butler named two tax relief programs she’d like to take effect, including the return of the earned income tax credit and allowing circuit breakers to alleviate homeowners from property tax rather than deferring the owed amount.
Merrick told Port City Daily his win signified how important the cost of living is to his constituents.
“I was for the folks who are having a hard time putting gas in their truck, people who are having a hard time affording their healthcare, those people who couldn’t believe their electric bill went up $150 a month,” Merrick said.
All three electees also support the state rolling back the expansion of the Opportunity Scholarship program, an effort spearheaded by Lee. In its current iteration, the program provides money for all families, regardless of income, to attend private school, whereas it had operated before by offering money only to lower-income households.
Butler said she expected the Democratic House to curtail eligibility for the scholarship pretty immediately, but would like to see the program phased out entirely.
Though careful about talking about his presumptive win before all ballots were counted, Merrick said, if elected, he would love to continue his work in education reform from the state level after having served on the New Hanover County Board of Education since 2024.
North Carolina has consistently ranked near the bottom among all 50 states for per-pupil spending. Many detractors to the current system argue the model, which pays one amount per student based on school enrollment, does not account for the increased costs associated with certain student populations, such as exceptional children or those from low-income families. Additionally, the allotment formula doesn’t account for how staff members are spread across buildings; for example, if the state only provides for one art teacher every 500 students, smaller schools have to share a teacher or find local money to fund their own.
The state legislature has also denied funding the Leandro plan, remedial guidelines calling for the legislature to inject several billion into public school spending.
Merrick said he was not a fan of “admiring a problem for too long” and thought, with the state’s prior and current explorations into both the student allotment formula and how the state grades schools, there were probably solutions at this point the General Assembly could put into action.
As for Bichler, she said she would like to serve on a committee that focuses on healthcare and medical costs; additionally, she said she would also like to start exploring state changes to make housing more affordable.
Port City Daily asked both Bichler and Merrick how they would define success in their first legislative session, set to begin on Jan. 13. They both pointed to being a novice and needing to learn the ropes.
“I ran on things that matter to me, so my intention is to get to work on those things immediately, and I already have made such great relationships with some of our sitting senators that I’ll know I’ll have some fantastic mentors in the Senate,” Bichler said.
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