NORTH CAROLINA — In front of an audience filled with friends, family and supporters, Roy Cooper reflected on his time leading the state during his farewell speech at Nash County Community College, where he launched his campaign almost a decade ago.
Approaching the end of his two-term limit, North Carolina’s top leader will exit the Governor’s Mansion in Raleigh at the end of the month. Incoming Democratic Governor Josh Stein will take the oath on Jan. 1, 2025.
Cooper praised Stein in his speech:
“I leave this office in the good hands of the governor elect, who will continue to build on our success and blaze his own new trails, but for the last eight years, getting to lead the state I love so much has been an extraordinary privilege, challenging, humbling, and the best job I’ve ever had and I have valued every day.”
Cooper’s political career started out in the state House in the mid ‘80s, before he moved onto the Senate in the early ‘90s. He was elected attorney general in 2000 and won three more re-elections before deciding to challenge then-Gov. Pat McCrory in 2016. Cooper won by a little more than 10,000 votes.
He signed roughly 100 vetoes during his time as governor, with half of them overridden by the Republican supermajority, according to reporting from The Assembly. He faced stalemates over budgets passing, as well as criticisms for the state’s handling of natural disasters, including Hurricanes Florence and more recently Helene.
The global pandemic proved one of the governor’s toughest moments, though one study done by N.C. State ranked North Carolina in the top 25% nationwide in its handling of the pandemic.
Cooper made the call to shutter schools and businesses, enacted stay-at-home orders and put in place mask mandates, all of which garnered controversial feedback. The governor was even sued by some bar owners for discriminating against their re-opening while months earlier other businesses were allowed to welcome back customers with safety measures in place.
Yet, Cooper focused on his successes Wednesday, calling it his “great comeback story.”
When he came into office, House Bill 2 was on the books. Sponsored by Republican Dan Bishop — who lost the attorney general election this year, but is now considered for Trump’s administration — the bill targeted transgender people and required the public to use restrooms that corresponded with the sex listed on their birth certificate.
Cooper noted it thwarted business in the state, a loss estimated to be billions of dollars. Netflix pulled productions, including what ended up being its popular hit series “Outer Banks.” The National Collegiate Athletic Association and the Atlantic Coast Conference pulled almost two dozen championships from the state, and the NBA relocated its All-Star Game. Private companies — like PayPal, slated to come to Charlotte — abandoned plans.
H.B. 2 was fully repealed by December 2020, a year after the state was ticking back up in its business dealings. From 2019 through 2024, North Carolina ranked in the top five best states to do business, coming in first in 2022 and 2023, according to CNBC.
“640,000 new jobs were created during your leadership in North Carolina,” the governor’s former chief of staff, Kristi Jones, praised as she introduced Cooper.
Cooper called never giving up on Medicaid expansion a shining moment — not mention an “intergenerational investment” in people’s health. Republican lawmakers were against the notion, so much that in 2013 they signed a law forbidding its expansion. They even tried to sue Cooper in 2017 when he took office for attempting to to do, but by Dec. 1, 2023, the bipartisan law was enacted, as opposition died down once Medicaid became a managed-care system.
It also helped that Cooper had the backing from business leaders, as well as law enforcement dealing with increased mental illness and substance abuse cases, each reaching out to Republican lawmakers.
“Getting Medicaid expansion passed was a little more than a pipe dream when I came to office,” Cooper said. “But the prospect of getting health care for hundreds of thousands of North Carolinians was too important. I knew that passing Medicaid expansion would be the working families bill of the decade.”
Around 600,000 more North Carolinians have health insurance since it passed. In 2024 alone, it allowed 3.8 million prescriptions to be filled, $58 million in claims for dental services and made more than 200,000 people from rural communities eligible.
Cooper also enacted a medical debt relief program, which he called a “pioneering solution.” The program leverages federal funds, allowing hospital participants to get more in Medicaid payments if it relieves medical debt. So far, it’s amounted to $4 billion for two million North Carolinians.
The governor touted his work with green solutions statewide, signing in 2018 the North Carolina Clean Energy Plan. North Carolina became the second state nationwide to put a carbon reduction requirement on power producers with the bipartisan-passed H.B. 951, asking energy plants to meet 70% reduction by 2030 and eliminating them altogether by 2050.
Cooper also called the Tar Heel State the “epicenter for the clean energy economy,” noting companies like Wolfspeed, Toyota, Boom Supersonic, Siemens Energy, Kempower, and Natron bringing in thousands of “good-paying clean energy jobs.” He added the supply chain to make electric vehicle components has North Carolina leading the way in the industry.
“We have a claim to every link in the supply chain from the silicon chips to the electric batteries, all the way to the charging stations,” Cooper said.
He also tackled public education. Cooper announced 2024 the Year of Public Schools, pressing upon lawmakers to invest more into them as Republican lawmakers put millions more in funding for the Opportunity Scholarship.
During his tenure, he saw more investments in nutrition programs, expansion of pre-K, reinstated the Teaching Fellows program, and created the Finish Line Grants program to keep students in school. The latter affected around 16,000 students who have received a degree or credential to date.
He also noted public schools have an 87% graduation rate — ”the highest in North Carolina history” — with the state setting AP exam records. North Carolina had the most certified teachers than any other in the nation, Cooper said, and he was proud of the 19% school teacher raise passed during his terms.
It’s “not nearly enough but important to get,” he said.
“And yet. And yet. Right wing extremists and for profit schools have peddled a false narrative that our public schools are failing, using that lie to justify their programs to rob public taxpayer money and send it to private schools for the wealthy through vouchers,” Cooper said.
Public education has been a cornerstone in his life, as Cooper’s mother was a school teacher in Nash County. He remained hopeful a compromise between parties and disagreeing views could coalesce for future advancement of public education in the state.
“We expanded Medicaid by pulling together a nontraditional coalition of people who were able to convince Republican legislators it was important,” he said. “We are beginning to do the same thing for public schools. And we have to succeed. To keep our promise and ensure that our children can live up to theirs. We can’t stop now. We can’t let our children down.”
The next step in Cooper’s career remains unknown. When Vice President Kamala Harris announced she would take the place of President Joe Biden in the 2024 election, Cooper was on the shortlist among her potential VP picks. However, he asked to be removed, due to Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson — known for his controversial rhetoric and antics — potentially taking away from the presidential campaign as Robinson would step in as acting governor if Cooper left the state to rally for the Democratic bid.
Cooper was clear Wednesday, no matter what comes next, he maintains pride and hope for the future of his home state.
“We’ve restored our reputation as a welcoming place where people can thrive, innovate and grow,” he said, noting it was part of a CEO-like mission he established when he took the oath of office. “I wanted to build a North Carolina where people were better educated and healthier, with more money in their pockets and the opportunities to live with purpose and abundance. I knew these goals mattered to our quality of life now and for decades into the future, bringing strength and greatness for our people.
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