Here’s why I’m running for Court of Appeals

I love North Carolina. I’ve lived here my whole life; it’s where I met my wife, where we started our family, and where we will raise our son. I want a bright future for him and all of us, but more and more, that future feels out of reach. Years of fighting for that brighter future in court have convinced me that we only have one path out of darkness: we must reform our state appellate courts. North Carolina’s constitution and laws give us a roadmap to fully funded public schools, strong personal freedoms, and elections where voters pick their officials–not the other way around. We must elect judges who are willing and able to uphold these laws.

Unfortunately, recent history has shown that North Carolina’s appellate courts don’t have enough judges who are willing to protect our rights. After all the votes were counted in November 2024, Allison Riggs had won her race for North Carolina Supreme Court. Rather than concede, her opponent did something unprecedented: he tried to change the outcome by asking courts to toss out more than 60,000 votes from military members and other North Carolinians who followed all voting rules. As a lawyer on the case, I felt confident that these protests were not based in fact or supported by the law. But our Court of Appeals saw it differently. In a two-to-one party line vote, our Court of Appeals ordered the State Board of Elections to immediately throw out some votes and throw out others after a short cure process.

This was not the first time that our state appellate courts allowed politicians to trample our fundamental rights. For years, our courts have allowed politicians to defund our public schools, entrench themselves in power through gerrymandering, and intrude on the executive power of the Governor. I have litigated several of these cases, first as a lawyer for Josh Stein’s Department of Justice, and now in private practice.

We ultimately won Justice Riggs’s case in federal court: every lawful vote counted, and Allison Riggs’s win was honored. But the fact that our state courts were willing to violate our fundamental voting rights and undermine the results of a free and fair election was the last straw for me.

I have been around our courts since I was a small child and know we can do better. Our courts need a transformation: a new generation of judges who will always be fair and impartial to every party, but will also boldly and unapologetically defend our rights and the rule of law. That transformation cannot wait. It must start with this race.