With the NC governor election days away, Democratic AG Josh Stein aims to keep mansion blue
When Attorney General Josh Stein announced his campaign for governor in early 2023, it was no surprise, even that early in the campaign season. He had long been expected to seek to follow in the footsteps of his mentor, friend and fellow Democrat, Gov. Roy Cooper.
It wasn’t even the first time Stein had walked in those same footsteps. Stein’s two terms as attorney general followed Cooper’s four terms in the same job.
And since North Carolina’s governors are limited to two consecutive terms, it was a chance for Stein to once again follow the man he once worked for, back when Cooper was AG. The two remain close. But Stein is a different candidate in a different time, and is up against a very different opponent than anyone Cooper faced.
Stein’s campaign has been defined by his Republican opponent’s candidacy as much as, or perhaps even more so than, his own.
When Stein announced his run in January 2023, he came out on offense against Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson, who hadn’t yet entered the race. And now, nearly two years later and days from Election Day, the race has grown even more contentious.
Stein’s campaign ads targeting Robinson — relying on Robinson’s own words, from abortion to problems at his family-run daycare — have driven much of the conversation about the race.
That was all before the September surprise report from CNN KFile that tied Robinson to a series of extreme posts on a pornographic website, which Robinson denies he wrote.
Stein declines debates
There hasn’t been and won’t be any debates between Stein and Robinson. Even during the height of the coronavirus pandemic, Cooper debated his opponent, then-Republican Lt. Gov. Dan Forest.
Stein announced in September that he would not debate Robinson, even as Robinson called him out for it. That was all before the CNN report.
“He can go out there and try to sell his vision for North Carolina to the voters. I just didn’t want to be part of normalizing him and giving him a platform. ... I don’t need to talk to him to run for governor,” Stein told The News & Observer during a September campaign event.
In an interview with The N&O that month, Stein added that to debate Robinson would be to “normalize a man consumed by hate and grievance, and normalize a person who’s not normal.”
While he doesn’t want to talk to Robinson, he does talk about him.
Stein’s pitch
Stein’s pitch to voters lays out his vision versus Robinson’s. He’s given a version of this speech at many events, including during the primary, before the race was set.
“Stakes couldn’t be higher. The choice couldn’t be clearer. Two competing visions. Ours: forward, looking, positive, welcoming. It’s about fighting for every person, creating opportunities for every person, and tapping the potential of every person, so that together we build a safer, stronger North Carolina,” Stein told supporters at a campaign rally in Pittsboro in September.
He characterized Robinson’s vision as “one of division, violence and hate. It’s about fighting job-killing culture wars. He says the most awful things about people ... “ Stein continued, pulling snippets from Robinson’s speeches about women, teachers and LGBTQ+ people, among others.
Chuck Gillis and Jennifer Gillis, who live in Pittsboro, attended the Stein event, where Kentucky Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear hyped the crowd. It was the first Stein campaign event they had attended.
“I‘ve always been an admirer of (Stein), and I just thought that the Democrats had a strong candidate to follow up Roy Cooper’s governorship. So, I just definitely want to continue that. Don’t want us to go backwards,” Chuck Gillis said.
For Jennifer Gillis, she said she wanted to do “anything in my power to prevent Mark Robinson from becoming governor.”
“I just think he’s got that apocalyptic vision, just like Trump ... stuff that’s unbelievable. He’s anti-women’s rights, which I can’t abide. And just, I also just question his sanity. And just like I question Trump’s sanity,” she said.
Jennifer Gillis said she supports Stein because he is a “person of substance” who would benefit the state.
Stein said his top priority as governor would be investing in public schools.
Stein would be first Jewish governor of NC
Both Stein and Robinson would be a first for the state if they won: Robinson the first Black governor or Stein the first Jewish governor. Stein has said repeatedly that his faith guides him.
Robinson has a history of making antisemitic remarks online, though in 2023 he downplayed past comments, saying he’s “never been antisemitic.” Robinson also allegedly referred to himself online a decade ago as a “Black Nazi,” in the CNN report that Robinson has filed a defamation lawsuit over.
Stein called Robinson’s series of remarks “distressing, upsetting, infuriating and disqualifying.”
Stein said his faith teaches him that each person is called to make a difference in the communities they live in.
“When folks hate Jews and say antisemitic things, it’s very upsetting, because no one should feel that kind of targeting in this country. But understand, Mark Robinson’s hate is not limited to Jewish people. He says terrible things about women, so misogynistic and disrespectful. He says terrible things about Black people. He says terrible, almost unprintable things about gay people. He talks about Muslims. There’s not a group out there that he does not say awful things about,” Stein told The N&O.
“Every American, it does not matter who you are, has the exact same claim to the privileges of this country, the same right to enjoy what it means to be American: a fair shot at a better future. It’s called equality. It’s central to what this country is. He doesn’t get it, and that’s what upsets me most of all,” Stein said.
Stein’s career path
Stein was born in Washington, D.C., and moved to Charlotte as a baby. His dad, Adam Stein, helped start the first integrated law firm in the state. The family moved from Charlotte to Chapel Hill in 1971, when his mom, Jane Stein, went to graduate school at UNC-Chapel Hill and his dad, a civil rights attorney, opened a branch of the firm there.
Stein’s origin story contrasts with those of Cooper and other North Carolina Democratic governors who have hailed from rural areas. Cooper is from Nash County and went to UNC. Stein left the state for college, receiving his bachelor’s degree from Dartmouth College and his master’s of public policy and juris doctor from Harvard University. But the fathers of both Cooper and Stein were lawyers, like their sons. Stein’s father has given large donations to Democrats in the past.
Stein always knew he wanted to go to law school and policy school.
“Part of it was the fish swimming in the water metaphor — I was just raised in a house where the law was central to everything, and it’s how my brain works. I’m a very rational person, and it just it made sense. It was sort of like — a lot of people take their parents’ trade — and that was what I did,” he told The N&O.
“I knew I wanted to do something about trying to make things fairer for more people,” Stein said.
His first job after law school was in the real estate and affordable housing development arm of Self-Help Credit Union in Durham.
That was in the 1990s. Stein left to work on former U.S. Sen. John Edwards’ campaign. He went on to work for Cooper in the early 2000s, when Cooper was the attorney general. So did now-N.C. Sen Jay Chaudhuri.
Cooper served as AG for four terms, from 2000 to 2016, before running for governor. Stein and Chaudhuri overlapped at the Department of Justice for eight of those years, and worked together closely during a multistate investigation to instill safeguards from child predators on social media sites MySpace and Facebook. Chaudhuri was special counsel, and Stein led Cooper’s consumer protection division.
What stands out to Chaudhuri from that time was that “there wasn’t a better negotiator at the table than Josh Stein.” He also noted how Stein interacted with others at work.
“Josh was highly respected by the attorneys of the consumer protection section. He commanded a lot of respect, I think, for the way he treated the attorneys, treated supporting staff, and for his ability to lead that section,” Chaudhuri said.
Stein later served in the state Senate, and when he left to run for attorney general, Chaudhuri ran for Stein’s seat and won. Chaudhuri, who is now the Senate Democratic whip, noted that Stein served in the majority party during his first term, then in the minority party after Republicans gained control.
“(Stein) was able to be a leading voice on a number of issues that are important to progressives, including fighting for education and fighting for voting rights and speaking out on reproductive rights. He was also a prodigious fundraiser and helped Senate Democrats stay competitive in trying to pick up seats and try to move the Senate Democrats out of the superminority status,” Chaudhuri said.
Sheriff cooperation with ICE detainers
In the legislature, Stein worked across the aisle on public safety legislation.
The N&O has asked Stein repeatedly for his stance on the Republican-written House Bill 10, which requires sheriffs to cooperate with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detainers. Stein has dodged the questions. In May, he didn’t address the specific proposal, instead saying that “folks need to understand that if you commit a crime in this state, no matter your immigration status, you will be held accountable.”
The final version of the bill, which Cooper vetoed and Republicans plan to override, also funded about $500 million in private school vouchers.
Asked again about the issue in September, Stein talked about the education aspect of the bill, saying the detainer aspect wasn’t a separate bill from the vouchers.
“The thing is, that’s not how the bill is. The bill has the vouchers in it, which is taking hundreds of millions of dollars away from public schools, taxpayer money, to give to private schools to fund unaccountable education for children,” he said.
Pressed, Stein said that the legislature “packages things together” and you have to take the bill as a whole.
Immigration is a hot-button issue nationally, one that Republicans tend to emphasize and that has been politically thorny for Democrats.
Stein got support of Democrats, and Cooper, early
Stein had one primary challenger: Mike Morgan, who retired as a justice on the N.C. Supreme Court in September 2023 to start his campaign. Stein had a head start on him by a long shot in terms of both fundraising and endorsements, including the endorsement of Cooper. Morgan called the number of Democrats who “coalesced” around Stein so early in the campaign “disheartening.”
A year ago, Cooper introduced Stein at a Raleigh campaign rally launch.
“I know that the key our progress moving forward, is we need the right person to take it over when I leave. And I’ve thought about it a lot. We need a person with integrity and grit. We need a person who’s ready to work hard to get things done and put bipartisan coalitions together to make things happen. We need a person who will never back down from doing the right thing,” Cooper said.
He went on to say that Stein would “keep our momentum going while blazing new trails.”
State Sen. Natalie Murdock, a Durham Democrat who once worked for Stein, told The N&O at that event that she endorsed Stein “early on because I really think we’re going to have to look at it as a continuation of the work that Gov. Cooper has done.”
Stein’s family
Stein’s wife, Anna Stein, is also an attorney, but chose policy over politics for her career, and most recently, public health.
Anna and Josh Stein met when they were both in law school in the 1990s, on the first day of an internship at the N.C. Department of Justice. She went to law school at UNC-Chapel Hill while her future husband was at Harvard. They both had connections early in their careers with people who still work in politics and government: for her, that was being a law clerk for then-Judge Joe John, who is now a state representative.
She took a 10-year career break, she told The N&O in an interview, when they had their three now-grown children, and then went back to school for a master’s degree in public health, also from UNC-Chapel Hill. She then spent 12 years at the N.C. Department of Health and Human Services until she left that job in September. Her job entailed policy around substances, she said, from tobacco to opioids and overdose prevention.
“If Josh wins, that’s a whole new role, and takes a lot of ramp-up, so I wanted to give myself just a little break,” she said.
She was targeted by Robinson in August as being behind the N.C. DHHS scrutiny of a children’s nutrition nonprofit run by Robinson’s wife, Yolanda Hill. Josh Stein called the accusation “false” at the time.
Anna Stein said she found Robinson’s accusation “hilarious” because it was “so preposterous.”
She doesn’t like politics, but does like policy, she said. Anna Stein said that as first lady she would want to work on“trying to reduce stigma against people with substance use disorders and mental health disorders.”
“And that’s definitely a continuation of my work, directly out of the work that I’ve been doing,” she said.
Stein and the legislature
If Stein wins, he’ll likely be facing a Republican-controlled General Assembly, as Cooper has. Republicans now have a supermajority, but only by one vote in each chamber. A three-fifths supermajority means total control, with Republicans having enough votes to override vetoes. Republicans have overridden every Cooper veto this year, or plan to do so. With a simple majority, Republicans would need some Democrats to vote with them on veto overrides.
All 170 seats in the legislature are on ballots, too, so the levers of power in the state will be determined by voters on Nov. 5.
“(Democrats) are working hard to try to restore balance to state government, where it’s not one party running roughshod over the other party, and, frankly, running roughshod over people’s rights,” Stein said.
“And so I’m hoping that Democrats have a really good year this November, and we elect a lot of Democrats in swing districts, and we can break the supermajority — which, if we do, will give my veto a lot more power.”
This story was originally published October 24, 2024 at 8:00 AM with the headline "With the NC governor election days away, Democratic AG Josh Stein aims to keep mansion blue."
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