Congressman Madison Cawthorn made national news last week by announcing he would jump ship and run in a different district next year — and by the luck of the draw, his first public debut since the political bombshell happened to be right here in Haywood County.
Cawthorn had been booked as the keynote speaker for the Haywood GOPs Saturday night Fall Fling weeks ago, but his appearance took on new import at the 11th hour. Anticipation was rampant over what Cawthorn would tell the crowd about giving up his home seat in WNC and instead running for Congress in an adjacent district to the east.
“I understand it is an unconventional move. It’s not something most people would do. I had a very safe re-election in this seat,” Cawthorn said, addressing the issue about half-way through his 10-minute speech. “But I genuinely believe we live in dire times, and it calls for unconventional measures to save this nation.”
Indeed, Cawthorn has been nothing if not unconventional his first year in Washington as the youngest member of Congress. He’s branded himself as an anti-establishment Republican, unabashedly aligned with the Trump-wing of the party.
Still, Cawthorn’s move seemed puzzling. Why give up a safe run as an incumbent in your own mountain district to run in a newly created district that reaches to the outskirts of Charlotte?
But Cawthorn had clearly done the math. Newly drawn lines for North Carolina’s Congressional districts shuffled the deck chairs for Cawthorn’s home territory — renaming it from District 11 to District 14. It still leans Republican, but slightly less so now.
The new lines for District 14 rope in Watauga County — home to liberal-leaning Boone and Appalachian State University — while jettisoning the conservative strongholds of McDowell, Rutherford and Polk.
In Cawthorn’s old District 11, 56% of voters went for Trump in 2020. But in the newly drawn District 14, Trump support was 53.8%. Meanwhile, the newly drawn District 13 that Cawthorn is switching to favored Trump by 60%.
“Both are safe districts, but the 13th is safer,” said Chris Cooper, a political analyst and director of WCU’s Public Policy Institute.
That alone doesn’t explain Cawthorn’s jump, however.
“This is where the normal calculus doesn’t apply,” Cooper said. “Madison Cawthorn’s gotten to wherever he’s gotten by challenging norms and drawing attention.”
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