Special interest RINO PAC's buy legislative seats across NC, including our own | Eastern NC Now

Dark money special interest PAC's dumping large sums of money into independent expenditure campaigns in legislative races around the state have snagged a number of House and Senate seats away from conservatives.  One of those was in our own 79th House district.

The biggest prize of all, however, is still up in the air.  Arrogant and corrupt senate boss Phil Berger is trailing his conservative challenger, Rockingham County Sheriff Sam Page by only two votes after all votes were counted.  Given the Berger machines control of local offices in the district, the fear of hanky-panky to shift those numbers is very high.  Special interest PAC spending for Berger is said to have topped $50 million, a record in a state legislative race and he outspent Page 53 to 1.

In the 79th district dark money special interest PAC's spent at least half a million dollars to buy the seat for their preferred candidates, former Marc Basnight Democrat turned "Republican" Darren Armstrong.  This is, by far, the most money ever spent on a legislative seat in this area.  This involved a blizzard of postcards, including misleading ones  calling incumbent conservative Kidwell a "sellout" and a TV ad campaign.

Two sets of PACs were involved.  One set was created recently by Berger's allies in the gambling industry, which set up dark money PACs Win for America and the mislabeled "American Conservative Fund".  Another set has been around a while, the NC Ag Partnership which funnels dark money to the NC Ag Action PAC.  In 2025, every dollar of money to the latter came from the former, but the former does not file reports to show where it got the money, making it :dark money". Nobody know who was really bankrolling these campaigns. The NC Ag Partnership also shares both offices and leadership with an NGO involved in Berger's attempt to shut down our shrimping industry.  These PAC;s ran independent expenditure operations where they campaign for or against particular candidates.

In the Senate, the biggest effort of the dark money special interest PAC's was directed at trying to save Berger, but they also went after incumbent conservative senator Chris Measmer in Cabarrus County, and against conservative retired Superior Court Judge Jerry Tillet in the open 1st district in northeastern NC.  Measmer had been selected by local party leaders to fill a vacancy but was not the sort of yes-man Berger prefers, and the special interest money bought the seat for a former liberal  House member who had been tossed out by primary voters a couple of terms back for his very liberal voting record.  Tillet prevailed over the wave of money spent against him, which was backing a big farmer, who like Armstrong, had been recruited by liberal legislator Jimmy Dixon.  One advantage Tillet had was that another farmer, who was opposed to the Troxler / Dixon / Berger clique also ran and spent most of his campaign attacking the Dixon-recruited big farmer.

In the House, the big target was the head of the conservative Freedom Caucus, Keith Kidwell, who narrowly fell to the onslaught.  Other Freedom Caucus members faced less special interest money against them and survived.  The special interest PAC's however were successful in derailing a promising dynamic conservative in an open House seat in Lee and Moore counties, conservative Lee County School Board member Sherry Lynn Womack.  An establishment Republican backed by the special interests won that primary.

In Beaufort County, a number of less-than-conservative candidates networked with Armstrong's campaign and prevailed over more conservative opponents.  These included District Judge candidate Lloyd Williams, who was endorsed by liberal Democrat judges, school board candidate Monica Davis, who had been a Democrat most of the time she has lived in Beaufort County, and county commission candidate John Edwards.   Sheriff candidate Kerry Cox also networked with Armstrong but narrowly failed to unseat incumbent conservative sheriff Scott Hammonds.