Jeff Jackson wins Democratic nod for NC attorney general, AP says, will face Dan Bishop

Jeff Jackson won the Democratic primary for attorney general Tuesday night, setting up a high-stakes showdown with Republican Dan Bishop in November to be North Carolina’s top law enforcement official.

The Associated Press called the race for Jackson, who has been representing a Charlotte-area congressional district since last year, at 9:38 p.m.

Polls closed at 7:30 p.m. With all 2,659 precincts across the state reporting, Jackson had won 54% of the vote, according to unofficial results from the State Board of Elections. Durham County District Attorney Satana Deberry trailed Jackson with 33% of the vote. Fayetteville attorney Tim Dunn had 12% of the vote.

In a statement, Jackson said he was grateful for the support he received across the state, and expressed his appreciation for Deberry and Dunn’s campaigns and service.

“The job of Attorney General is to stand between the people of the state and those that mean them harm,” Jackson said. “It’s not about culture wars — it’s just about doing what’s right.”

Jackson added that the state’s next attorney general will need to “defend our kids from fentanyl and keep them safe online, go after scammers who target our bank accounts, and corporations who break the rules and pollute our water.”

The attorney general’s race is expected to be one of the most competitive and expensive races on the ballot this November.

Republicans have been shut out of the attorney general’s office for more than a century. The last time a GOP candidate was elected to the office was in 1896.

But recent contests for the state’s top law enforcement position have been exceedingly close. In 2020, Democratic Attorney General Josh Stein defeated Republican Jim O’Neill by just 13,622 votes, or 0.26%.

In the Democratic primary, Jackson, who has been representing the state’s 14th Congressional District in the U.S. House since January 2023, faced off against Deberry, the top prosecutor in Durham County, who has argued on the campaign trail that she is the most qualified candidate, and Dunn, a veteran of the Marines who served for more than 33 years and runs a law practice in Fayetteville.

Waiting in the fall will be U.S. Rep. Dan Bishop, who is the only Republican running for attorney general, and as such, did not appear on GOP primary ballots on Tuesday.

Bishop and Jackson are two of North Carolina’s most prominent congressmen. A member of the House Freedom Caucus, Bishop was one of 20 Republicans who contested the election of former Speaker Kevin McCarthy last year.

Deberry: Campaign did ‘a hell of a good job’

Deberry spoke to The News & Observer after the AP called the race for Jackson.

“I feel fine, I feel like we said some of the things we wanted to say (in the race),” Deberry said at an election night watch party in Durham.

If it had been a May primary she was running in, Deberry said she believed she would have bested Jackson.

“We did a hell of a good job,” Deberry said, describing herself as a “scrappy” candidate. “We got endorsements from actual people, not corporate groups. Every time actual people got the chance to endorse us, they did.”

Asked about political ads supporting her campaign that were funded by a Republican-funded super PAC, she said she had “nothing to do with that.”

“I feel like the media puts too much emphasis on the money,” Deberry said. “Rather than talking about the issues that everyday North Carolinians are facing, they were focused on the horse race.”

“Good luck to Jackson,” she said. “Dan Bishop can’t be our next AG, that’s for sure.”

Deberry said she looked forward to continuing her work as district attorney, an office she holds until 2026. She laughed and danced with her campaign manager and others at Viceroy, where the Durham People’s Alliance held its watch party.

The two major Democratic candidates

Jackson entered the race in October, declining to run for another term in the House after GOP state lawmakers enacted a new congressional map that drew him out of his district, replacing a temporary map that was put into place by the N.C. Supreme Court in 2022, for use only in that year’s elections.

In less than a year on Capitol Hill, Jackson received national attention for building an immense following on social media, particularly on TikTok, where he reached millions of people with videos explaining the goings-on of Congress.

After announcing his campaign for attorney general, Jackson quickly locked down support from many influential Democrats in North Carolina, including all of the Democrats in the state’s congressional delegation, and several Democrats in the General Assembly. He was also quick to raise money.

By mid-February, Jackson’s campaign had raised nearly $3 million. Bishop’s campaign had raised just over $1.5 million by that point.

Deberry challenged Jackson’s experience for the job, and argued she would be uniquely able to excite a broad coalition of voters that includes African Americans, women, young voters, rural voters, and seniors, ahead of the general election. She’s raised far less money than Jackson and Bishop have, but has argued that fundraising isn’t the most important factor.

AG’s race already attracting outside spending

Outside groups are expected to pour millions of dollars into this race between now and November, and some already have.

A new super PAC that started buying ads in support of Deberry, touting her liberal credentials, spent more than $950,000 on TV, radio and digital ads last month.

Recently published election filings showed the mysterious group was funded by $1 million from the Republican Attorneys General Association in early February, The News & Observer reported on Saturday.

Jackson blasted the spending by RAGA as a “mass deception effort,” while Deberry, who said her campaign had nothing to do with the super PAC, said she didn’t care “what big money wants in this race,” and was focused on “what regular people need from their Attorney General.”