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In North Carolina, AG Announces Campaign to Unseat Governor

Attorney General Roy Cooper presented himself to voters Monday as a standard-bearer who can restore North Carolina to a legacy tarnished by three years of Republican domination by recommitting to education and fighting for the working class and small businesses.

Attorney General Roy Cooper presented himself to voters Monday as a standard-bearer who can restore North Carolina to a legacy tarnished by three years of Republican domination by recommitting to education and fighting for the working class and small businesses.

 

Cooper formally launched his campaign aimed at unseating Gov. Pat McCrory with an announcement at Nash Community College that was long expected, but became his first opportunity to outline his beliefs to a statewide audience.

 

Cooper contrasted his rural roots as a small-town lawyer with that of McCrory, a big-city mayor and power-company executive whose agenda, he argues, contrasts with the needs of everyday people.

 

“Growing up here in eastern North Carolina it felt like we were a state on the move, brimming with new jobs and new technologies, anchored by a world-class university system and strong public schools. But no longer,” Cooper said. “The crowd that’s in charge in Raleigh is leading us down the wrong path. Giving to those at the top while forcing everyone else to pay more and get less…

 

“But I know North Carolina can lead the South again.”

 

The setting for Cooper’s announcement in eastern North Carolina was a traditional stronghold for the Democratic Party – a region of the state that produced recent Democratic governors. For three decades, Cooper has been a part of that structure, first as a member of the General Assembly and for the past 14 years as the state’s attorney general.

Caroline Cournoyer is GOVERNING's senior web editor.
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