While North Carolina is urbanizing at a rapid pace, its rural voters still hold significant political power: more than a third of North Carolina’s population lives in one of the state’s 78 rural counties. Most people picture white people when talking about rural residents but North Carolina’s rural population is deceptively diverse: over 30% of the state’s rural voting population is nonwhite (and that proportion expands to 45% when looking only at the under-18 population.) Three of North Carolina’s congressional districts have a majority rural voting base: one of those is majority-Black (NC-1) and the other two (NC-3 and NC-9) are diversifying rapidly.

However, North Carolina Democrats have practically shunned campaigning in many of these rural communities as the state party failed to nominate a candidate in 44 state legislative races last cycle. (In other words, North Carolina Democrats handed Republicans 25% of the state’s legislative seats before a single vote was cast simply because voters didn’t have other options.) In this environment, Republicans run campaigns however they please, typically placing a laser focus on courting white voters through the alienation of marginalized groups. This leaves the expanding population of rural racial minorities without any reasonable political options and renders them practically invisible to both parties. Minority rural voters struggle to get politicians to acknowledge their existence and desperately need representation.

Rural Democrats Made The Difference in Georgia

“Georgia can be an example of what long-term planning and power building can bring about… The results of 2020 didn't happen because people got motivated and involved that January, it's a result of dedication and commitment over years of time… that’s not easy to do.” -Kelly Dietrich, founder and CEO of the National Democratic Training Committee

While much of the attention surrounding Joe Biden’s win in Georgia during the 2020 presidential election was focused on Atlanta, the constituency that ultimately sent Biden into the White House were Georgia’s rural Black voters. These voters provided a vital counterbalance to Donald Trump’s strength in rural counties, preventing him from creating a coalition to outnumber Democratic voters in Atlanta.

“If you take away 15,000 Democratic votes from rural Georgia, Biden doesn’t win Georgia.”

-Manswell Peterson, a former Democratic candidate for Georgia Secretary of State

Bridging the Rural-Urban Divide

A similar approach to rural outreach must be applied in North Carolina if Democrats want to have a chance at reclaiming power and the state’s new Democratic chairwoman is ready to implement it. In February 2023, 25-year old Anderson Clayton was elected as the chair of North Carolina’s Democratic party, making her the youngest state party chairperson in the nation. Clayton grew up in rural Roxboro, NC; a small town roughly 60 miles north of the state capital. She was previously the chair of the Person County Democratic Party (which oversees Roxboro) and also worked as a broadband analyst for Rural Innovation Strategies. Her background matches the direction she wants to take North Carolina’s Democrats:

“The Democratic Party fundamentally left behind rural areas. When we started to see demographic shifts and changes in our country about where Democratic voters were going to live, we started to leave out whole populations of geographic areas where Democrats still exist. People ask me all the time, "What did it feel like to organize in 2020 in the heart of ‘Trump Country’?” I tell people that I didn't organize in the heart of "Trump Country"; I organized in the heart of a place where people felt like government had failed them, because they didn't see that government was actually working for them.” 

-Anderson Clayton, NC Democratic Party Chair

As a member of Gen Z, Clayton also understands the demographic nuances of young voters in rural North Carolina. She aims to use her youthful progressivism to turnout this overlooked constituency and understands that young, racially diverse communities aren’t exclusive to cities. As mentioned above, the NC Democratic Party’s previous strategy was to focus on winnable races while ignoring “redder” pastures. In a much needed strategy shift, Clayton is looking beyond electability and wants to recruit messengers in places where they are absent:

“I'm asking [candidates] to be a champion of the Democratic message in a rural community that right now needs to hear it. And you know what? I think I would do that any day of my life. I know that there are rural people out there right now that are angry at not having a choice because democracy is not democracy without choices.”

-Anderson Clayton, NC Democratic Party Chair

What’s most dismaying about Democrats’ recent failures with reaching rural voters is that they already push for policies that rural voters desperately need including Medicaid expansion, remedying food insecurity and rural broadband solutions. The problem is that the party doesn’t organize and invest enough in rural communities where they’d be able to make a difference. Their absence often leads to Republicans taking credit for the work of Democrats, with some politicians even touting benefits they voted against.

Empowering Rural Racial Minorities

This ‘purple’ state is currently within reach for Democrats: Joe Biden only lost North Carolina by ~75,000 votes in the 2020 presidential election. A clear path forward has emerged and local Democrats can see it on the ground, yet it remains elusive to national party leaders in Washington. Democratic presidential candidates have been trying to flip North Carolina with an urban strategy for decades and it’s only worked once in the last 30 years. Meanwhile, the state has had several Democratic governors; all of whom relied on rural minority voters to mount winning campaigns. State Reps. Ray Jeffers and Diamond Staton-Williams both provide recent, winning examples of how Democrats can organize successful campaigns outside of urban areas. These Black candidates won crucial races that ultimately prevented Republicans from taking complete control of state government.

The problem Democrats are facing is that many in the party flatten rural experiences into a thin demographic profile. It’s easy to hear “rural” and think of White, ‘Trumpy’ conservative voters. But a growing subset of North Carolina’s rural voters are racially diverse, progressive and desperately want access to resources to enhance their political power. The only way Democrats can tap into this power is by allowing their perceptions of rural voters to be challenged and funneling investment toward local organizations that already “get” it.

Leftover Links

• Hear directly from rural voters in North Carolina (thanks to Down Home NC)

• Studies have shown that even though most rural residents have less access to healthcare than urban residents, rural minorities often have less access to healthcare than their rural white neighbors.