RINOs backed by Big Gambling special interest stumble in general election. | Eastern NC Now

One of the special interest PACs that spent $700,000 in dark money to defeat conservative incumbent Keith Kidwell in the 79th district also took some key conservative scalps elsewhere in the primary.  In those other districts, the Big Gambling RINO lost the general election after taking out a conservative in the primary.  In the 79th district, Armstrong had no opponent on the ballot so he sailed through.

In Senate district 35, Big Gambling placed its bets on former RINO Rep. Kevin Crutchfield, who had lost the 2024 primary for his former Cabarrus County House district to a conservative due to Crutchfield's liberal voting record in Raleigh.  In 2026, Big Gambling paid big money for an outside campaign pushing Crutchfield as a "conservative" in order to defeat the true conservative incumbent in the primary.

Come the general election, Big Gambling did not get involved, and the long held GOP district fell to the Democrat by 57% to 42%.  So Big Gambling interference in the primary cost both the conservatives and the GOP a seat they should have won.

In the open but longtime GOP held House district 51 in Lee and Moore counties, Big Gambling placed a big primary bet with outside campaign spending to push liberal RINO Charles M. Taylor against genuine conservative stalwart Colonel Sherry Lynn Womack (Ret;'d), a member of the Lee County School Board.  Here, too, they spent big bucks to portray the liberal Taylor as a "conservative".  Again Big Gambling went MIA for the general election, and Taylor lost to Unaffiliated April Montgomery.  A local scandal had erupted over Taylor owning a building in Lee County used as an illegal gambling parlor.