Convincing Democrats to run for state legislatures in rural, ruby red Republican districts can be well-nigh mission impossible for party organizers.
There’s the double-whammy of having to beg for money and taking time off from full-time jobs.There’s also getting slimed by the GOP as a Socialist, Christian-hating, gun-grabbing, gay and trans-coddling, Woke baby killer.
Hence, there’s a dearth of Democrat candidates in conservative, Bible Belt rural America, AKA deepest Trumpistan.
But 27-year-old two-term North Carolina State Democratic Party Chair Anderson Clayton has sought out — and signed up — a slew of Team Blue candidates for her lege in some of the most crimsoned Tar Heel State counties.
Hence, Forward Kentucky publisher Bruce Maples invited her to be the keynote speaker for Saturday’s “Summit ‘25.” Maples, the host, billed the 18-speaker program as “An Online Event for People Who Want to Make a Difference.”
Maples praised all the speakers as “experts in their field” who “brought knowledge and experience to their talks. People commented repeatedly on how much they got out of the individual talks. Plus, many speakers uploaded their presentation to their talk page, where anyone logged in can download it.”
Clayton thinks her unorthodox approach to candidate recruitment can work in other Red states, including the Bluegrass State.
She doesn’t fill her recruits with false hopes of dramatic upset victories at the polls. In her presentation she warned against party recruiters telling candidates, “They’re going to have all the support in the world and that they … could win an election if they work hard enough.”
Instead, she said she tells them: “I ain’t trying to bullshit y’all and I never will. ... You are not here to win this election. You are here to put up a fight, and I need a fighter.
“I need somebody that’s willing to lose, that understands the opportunity that you have to be able to make a Republican spend money in their own district versus taking money and putting it into other districts that we need to win right now in order to gain back statewide power. And then, also, I need you to be able to hold Republicans accountable for the shit that they are doing and saying.”
She said hesitators might tell her, “Yes, I don’t want Republicans to go unchallenged and uncontested.” Clayton is ready with a reply: “Well, no one steps up and runs for this race unless you do.”
Clayton said naturally people “want to be a winner. They want to be able to say, ‘Yes, I ran for this and now I have the title for it.’ That’s just not the reality of the resistance right now. We need a resistance that’s willing to lose some things in order to be able to gain some.”
Clayton’ s success and her age have earned her newspaper and magazine headlines, and she’s been on TV, including MSNBC. “In 2024, it’s North Carolina Democrats who are ceding no ground, running candidates in 118 of 120 state House races and all 50 state Senate races,” wrote North Carolina Public Radio’s Steve Harrison. “The Democratic Party’s new chair, Anderson Clayton, made it a priority to run candidates in as many races as possible.”
His story included a screenshot of a Clayton social media post in which she pleaded, “DOES ANYONE KNOW SOMEONE IN LEE COUNTY, NORTH CAROLINA THAT WOULD BE WILLING TO PUT THEIR NAME ON THE BALLOT?!?!”
When Clayton was elected to her first two-year term in 2023 at age 25, she was the country’s youngest state party chair.
Clayton spends a ton of time on the road and away from party HQ in Raleigh, the state capital. She scouts for candidates and huddles with county parties. “I cannot do this job without my county party chairs,” she said.
Like Kentucky, North Carolina has a Democratic governor and a Republican-majority state legislature. Same as rural Kentucky, non-urban North Carolina is mostly Trump territory.
Though she’s a lifelong North Carolinian, Clayton has a Kentucky connection. In 2020, she worked on Amy McGrath’s senate campaign – after a stint in Iowa as a field organizer for Sens. Kamala Harris and Elizabeth Warren.
For the Summit, Clayton appeared on camera in casual attire, her blonde hair spilling from under a baseball cap. Her remarks were unscripted, folksy, funny, candid, and sometimes scatological.
Clayton “cares deeply about organizing local parties, especially in rural areas, since that is where she is from,” said Maples, adding that she is “both an excellent leader and an excellent manager. She can put forward a vision in a way that people get excited and buy into. That’s leadership. But she also thinks tactically about all the things that have to be done to achieve that vision. That’s management.”
He said Clayton isn’t “intimidated by the moment” and strikes him “as wise beyond her years, and while she is aware of the uniqueness of her situation, she doesn’t care much about that. She cares about the work — and is focused on it.”
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