80% Of NC Dems’ 2024 Individual Donations Came From Out-Of-State

The North Carolina Democrat Party raised nearly 80% of its 2024 individual contributions from out-of-state donors, while Republicans found support from actual North Carolinians, according to the Carolina Journal.

While President Donald Trump handily won North Carolina in 2024, the same cannot be said for statewide Republicans, which lost races for governor, lieutenant governor, and attorney general, as well as a legislative supermajority to stand as a bulwark against the new executive trifecta. The Republican is also behind in a state Supreme Court race, which is tied up in litigation and is yet to be officially decided.

An analysis done by the Carolina Journal and the John Locke Foundation using data from the North Carolina State Board of Elections shows that Democrats and Republicans had nearly inverse fundraising trends. While Democrats sourced 78.5% of their individual donor funding, or $4.2 million, from out-of-state donors, Republicans obtained 71.8%, or $2.8 million, of individual donor funding from inside the state.

“This is not as much of a shocker as you would expect it to be. Democrats have been moving more towards an out-of-state model, though this is the lowest amount of money they’ve raised in the last six years for in-state contributions,” Jim Stirling, research fellow at the John Locke Foundation’ Civitas Center for Public Integrity, told The Federalist.

Democrats’ reliance on out-of-state funding is likely to have implications for the 2026 midterms, because Republicans will have the in-state advantage on being able to stay connected with donors who have an actual stake in the elections in North Carolina. It also keeps Republicans “insulated from national political dynamics,” Stirling explained in the Carolina Journal.

Stirling told The Federalist that the Democrats’ need for outside donors could come down to a “trust issue from high-level donors” who may see state party leadership, like Democrat Party chair Anderson Clayton, as not up to the job. The party has trended away from in-state contributions since 2022.

Clayton, the state’s youngest ever chair — elected at the age of 25, does not have much experience outside of being a field organizer for the 2020 presidential campaigns of former Vice President Kamala Harris and Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., and a county party chair.

“Because of that, you’re going to have to convince these big donors that you know how to operate and run a political party and spend that money in a strategic way,” Stirling explained. “The question that these donors would have then is: Why put that money towards a chair that you are putting a gamble on where you can put money towards an organization that has shown success with folks like [former Democrat Gov.] Roy Cooper?”

Despite Democrat wins in the state in 2024, it is unclear to Democrats in North Carolina whether the party really helped, or if the scandal-ridden Republican gubernatorial candidate, Mark Robinson, was the deciding factor.

Finding money from higher-profile donors outside the individual donor party funding, the organization that was successful with Cooper and others is known as the Council of State Committee, or the Leadership Fund, and was able to obtain $42 million in contributions, giving Democrats a financial advantage over Republicans despite floundering in-state support. About $18 million of the $42 million was directed through the party.

The organization is run by high-level staffers who ran Cooper’s campaign. Further indication that there is a trust rift in Democrat fundraising, Stirling said, is that Cooper did not endorse Clayton when she ran.

In-state individual donations from key people, such as the parents of now-Gov. Josh Stein, D-N.C., who gave about $570,000, and the billionaire Sall family, which gave $4.5 million, made up about half of in-state donations to Democrats. According to the Carolina Journal, Stein himself transferred $13 million in funds to the state party from the Leadership Fund — allowing the Democrats to outpace Republicans, who raised $29 million.

Billionaire left-wing activist George Soros gave another $250,000, and former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg gave $3.5 million. Bloomberg divided his funds roughly $2.5 million to Leadership Fund and the rest to the state party, Stirling said.

Democrats are able to use an outsized amount of the money to overtake institutions in the state they do not already control as well.

Stirling said the Democrats have been focused on flipping the state Supreme Court for years — the only institution in the state with a race yet to be decided between the Republican and the Democrat.

The court went from 6-1 in favor of Democrats, to its current 5-2 Republican majority, with incumbent Democrat candidate Justice Allison Riggs being one of the two. Her race is currently in litigation, as she miraculously overcame a 10,000-vote lead for Republican candidate Judge Jefferson Griffin over the course of nine days following Election Day. Jefferson sued to challenge certain ballots.

But Democrats pumped over $5 million into Riggs’ race, which Stirling said is “nearly unheard-of,” compared to Griffin raising just over $2 million. She raised and spent double what Griffin did, and came up with a 734-vote lead.

Breccan F. Thies is an elections correspondent for The Federalist. He previously covered education and culture issues for the Washington Examiner and Breitbart News. He holds a degree from the University of Virginia and is a 2022 Claremont Institute Publius Fellow. You can follow him on X: @BreccanFThies.