RALEIGH — Democrats in the state House of Representatives are open to working with Republicans on legislation that could lower costs for North Carolinians even though the state Senate’s leadership has yet to be determined, House Speaker-elect Robert Reives said Tuesday.
Democrats won control of the state House for the first time in 15 years in last week’s elections. Republicans have held majorities in both chambers since 2011, often holding enough seats over that time to adopt many of their proposals with ease — even over objections of Democratic governors. The advantage has helped the GOP enact tax cuts, add abortion limits, reduce firearm restrictions, expand access to private schools, redraw congressional and legislative districts and more.
Democrats won at least 66 of the House’s 120 seats in the Nov. 3’s elections. Some House seats were still too close to call on Tuesday as officials began the process of counting provisional ballots.
While recounts are possible in some of those races, Reives said the election results show that voters want changes in policy. Democrats are poised to swear-in the largest Democratic majority in the state House since 1992, he said. At the same time, Reives said, voters want to see action: not gridlock.
“Compromise is not capitulation. Compromise is the job,” Reives said.
He continued: “But make no mistake, we understand that Democrats have won this chamber and we won it overwhelmingly. We have priorities that we want to see enacted. Many of those policies we have filed bills on for years just to see them ignored. We will be making a robust case for the agenda that got us elected, which we believe is the best for the people of this state, regardless of their income, race, gender, or zip code.”
Reives and Democratic North Carolina Gov. Josh Stein said last week that Democrats hope to address rising costs of housing, electricity and healthcare. Education will also be a top priority, they said.
Whether Democrats can deliver on their goals depends partly on who leads the state Senate, which remains unclear. Democrats flipped four Republican-held seats in the state Senate, leaving the GOP with 26 of the chamber’s 50 seats — and a contest in south-central North Carolina could ultimately decide which party gets control of the chamber.
Republican Sen. Danny Britt holds a 245-vote lead over Democratic challenger Catina Hamm in a district that covers Hoke, Robeson and Scotland counties. Local election officials still have more than 650 provisional ballots to examine, determine whether to accept, and then count.
If Hamm wins, the chamber would be split 25-25, giving Democratic Lt. Gov. Rachel Hunt the power to break tie votes and minority leader Sydney Batch, D-Wake, would likely become the next Senate leader.
If Britt prevails, Senate Republicans will be expected to elect the chamber’s next leader. Longtime Senate leader Phil Berger, R-Rockingham, lost his GOP primary in March to Rockingham County Sheriff Sam Page. Republican Sens. Jim Burgin of Harnett County, Ralph Hise of Mitchell County, Brent Jackson of Sampson County and Todd Johnson of Union County have announced plans to seek the leadership position.
On Tuesday, Reives addressed his relationship with the senate, his caucus’s goals, and more.
Medical marijuana: The changing House leadership could open the door for medical marijuana in North Carolina. The GOP-led state Senate passed several bills in recent years to legalize medical marijuana under what sponsors said would be the strictest rules in the country, but the GOP-led state House never allowed those bills to come up for a vote. A WRAL/WSOC Poll released last month found that only 15% of North Carolina voters oppose medical marijuana, and 74% want it legal — including majorities of every age group, political party, region of the state, and racial or ethnic demographic.
Reives said his caucus has expressed interest in exploring marijuana decriminalization: “Decriminalization of marijuana has been on top of everybody’s minds,” he said.
Reives added that he has personally seen how medicinal marijuana can help veterans.
“I’ve got a veteran family,” he said. “My dad served. My uncle served, and all that. And it’s just, I want everything we can to help our veterans, and that is one of the top items that people have talked about.”
Private school vouchers: Democrats have long criticized a state program that provides tuition vouchers to North Carolina families that enroll their child in a private school, and Reives said his caucus will look to roll it back to save the state money. “It is ridiculous that somebody who’s making millions of dollars gets a coupon from the state when we can’t afford to pay for public education,” Reives said.
The GOP-created Opportunity Scholarship program provides up to about $8,000 for the school year, depending on the family’s income. It served about 107,000 students last year, costing about $587 million. Stein has called for phasing-out the program, which started more than a decade ago as a program serving only the state’s lowest-income residents who were also not yet enrolled in a private school. Republican legislators opened the program to families of all incomes in 2024. Democratic proposals in recent years have largely focused on scaling back the Opportunity Scholarship voucher program, rather than eliminating it.
“We’ve got to recognize our revenues are limited,” Reives said. He continued: “You’ve got to have revenue, and [Republican legislators] have cut off so many sources of revenue and added so many fees that made life unaffordable. So opportunity scholarships, vouchers are in the same boat as every other thing that we’ve got.”
A rollback of the Opportunity Scholarship program would have the approval of many advocacy organizations that have long opposed the program’s expansion, in part because spending on the program represents to them money that could have been spent on public schools. “This is big money that’s being siphoned out of our public schools, which means public schools are being starved of having more having staff in the building, having resources like literal supplies, paper, pencil, books, curriculum, all of those things,” said Christina Cole, president of the North Carolina Association of Educators.
But the program has the support of other groups that caution a rollback of the program means a financial conundrum for some families. “We’ve got to ask, how is this a victory for education in our state?” said Mike Long, president of Parents for Educational Freedom in North Carolina. “Because it wouldn’t be. Because it would unequivocally deny 100,000 children whose families are pleased with the education that they’re receiving. It’s going to disrupt that and they’re not going to know what to do.”
Approving a budget: Reives has expressed optimism about reaching bipartisan agreement on a state budget, even if the Senate is controlled by Republicans. State lawmakers typically approve a comprehensive state spending plan every biennium, in odd-numbered years. However, after approving a budget in 2023, Republican legislative leaders failed to reach consensus on a spending plan in 2025 — citing disputes over tax rates, capital projects and more. Berger and House Speaker Destin Hall didn’t reach a tentative agreement until late June, with Stein signing it into law in July. Reives said he hopes the election results incentivize Republicans on a bipartisan solution.
“They can have the approach of … ‘Oh, we’ll take this all back in [2028,] and we’ll just be the party of no up until that time,’ which is not what North Carolinians or the United States voted for. Or [Republicans] can say: ‘This is a time that we can actually put in some real reforms,” Reives said.
Redistricting reform: Democrats have called on Republican state lawmakers to enact redistricting reform, and Reives said his caucus will likely bring forth legislation to that effect.
States traditionally redraw election maps every 10 years, after the U.S. Census Bureau publishes its decennial report on state populations. Redistricting has occurred on a more frequent basis in North Carolina in recent years, however, either because of court mandates or because legislators redrew them voluntarily. Maps approved by the GOP-controlled North Carolina General Assembly in 2023 gave Republicans an advantage in a majority of congressional and legislative districts.
State lawmakers then tweaked the maps again last year to place more Republican voters in North Carolina’s 1st Congressional District, held by Democratic U.S. Rep. Don Davis. It was part of a national effort in some Republican-led states to help keep a majority in the U.S. House. Democrats responded in some states they led with their own redistricting. Davis won reelection last week, and Democrats took control of the U.S. House.
“What I want to see is a permanent solution,” Reives said. “So any solution you see about independent redistricting will be something that the next legislature won’t be able to just throw out and start doing bad things again.”
Data centers: Reives said he believes local governments should be allowed to ban data center construction if they so choose, while acknowledging that some municipal moratoriums might conflict with state law that Republican legislators passed in 2024 that makes it harder to downzone property. The law was tucked in a wide-ranging bill aimed at providing relief to victims of Hurricane Helene, which caused $60 billion in damages to western North Carolina when it hit in September 2024. Reives said he disagrees with the law and hopes to empower municipalities to make their own decisions. “There are tons of municipalities and counties that would love to have a data center there. So it’s not about agreeing with data centers or not agreeing with data centers, the question is: who should make that decision?” Reives said.
Polls show that Republican and Democratic voters both want restrictions on data center development, Reives said. The WRAL/WSOC Poll released last month found North Carolinians split on the issue. Fewer than half of respondents — 43% — said they supported at least some development; 6% said the state should encourage more data-center development while 37% would allow data centers but only if they were required to pay full costs of the energy, water and infrastructure they require. Meanwhile 42% opposed their development, with 29% saying North Carolina should oppose additional data-center development in the state. Support for at least some data-center development was at 53% among Republicans, while 58% of Democrats opposed the development.
“We have been arrogant enough to think that we know better than everybody. We have made laws about issues we know nothing about,” Reives said. “Some of us have been commissioners, city council people, board of education members. And the minute we got into this building, we decided we were smarter than all those little guys that got elected. Those people matter.”