Activists are increasingly exercising their influence in the Tar Heel State.
Activists are increasingly exercising their influence in the Tar Heel State.
O n a May evening in Durham, the North Carolina Triangle chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America gathered outside Gateway Women’s Care, and a sitting North Carolina lawmaker stepped into their ranks. Democratic state representative Julie von Haefen stood beside the protesters, later writing in an Instagram post that she had joined Triangle DSA while at the demonstration.
The campaign against the pregnancy resource center began in Raleigh, where the DSA group applied pressure for two years by picketing outside Gateway’s location there, collecting petition signatures, and targeting its lease. When the site closed in early 2025, DSA claimed the outcome as an organizational victory.
Activists then carried the campaign to Durham. This time, von Haefen joined them, marking DSA’s evolution from a fringe group to a real political player.
A new Elon University poll suggests favorable political terrain for the DSA in the Tar Heel State. Fifty-six percent of North Carolina Democrats said “democratic socialist” described them “at least somewhat.” That does not make them official DSA members, or a unified socialist voting bloc, but it does show that a label once considered politically radioactive now resonates with much of the Democratic electorate in a presidential battleground state.
Triangle DSA is trying to turn that openness into durable political power. The group is remarkably candid about its methods. Its “Socialists in Office Committee” recruits candidates, oversees campaigns, and manages relationships with elected officials through what it calls “co-governance.” The chapter’s published record identifies three DSA-endorsed officeholders: Carrboro town council member Danny Nowell, Durham councilman Nate Baker, and Durham school board member Natalie Bent Kitaif.
The group’s offices are local and formally nonpartisan, but its strategy is much larger. The DSA can use municipal elections to build a political bench, train campaign volunteers, and perfect its get-out-the-vote machine. After Election Day, it will continue to seek influence through policy campaigns and coordination with officeholders it helped place.
Then comes the Democratic Party. The North Carolina Democratic Party’s (NCDP) structure provides organized activists with several ways in. Under the party’s Plan of Organization, representatives of affiliated caucuses hold voting seats on the Resolutions and Platforms Committee and the State Legislative Policy Committee, meaning they can submit resolutions and platform recommendations. Their presidents also vote on the State Executive Committee.
Triangle DSA is not itself an NCDP caucus, and ideological overlap does not prove organizational control. But a nexus begins to emerge through shared activists, allied campaigns, and policy coalitions. Progressive, Muslim, Arab, interfaith, and labor organizations campaign for Democratic candidates while pressuring those same candidates from inside the party structure. The DSA provides organizers and policy demands, and such affiliated groups have standing within the party.
That arrangement gives activists more than occasional access to candidates. It gives them a recurring voice inside the machinery shaping the party’s agenda. The DSA does not need an official caucus of its own when allied groups advance overlapping priorities through committees, resolutions, and platform debates. Its influence travels through coalitions without carrying the DSA label.
The results are visible in Democratic Party documents. The NCDP’s 2022 platform supported Medicare for All, universal childcare, unions, government-owned banks, and elimination of cash bail. It called free community college tuition a “worthy goal.” These positions overlap substantially with the DSA’s economic platform.
The 2025 resolution process reveals how Democratic Party factions exercise influence. The Resolutions and Platform Committee received more than 300 proposals but discussed and voted on only 26. All 26 received favorable recommendations. The package included an Israel arms embargo, restrictions on billionaire and corporate influence in Democratic primaries, and demands that law enforcement sever relationships with the Department of Homeland Security.
The State Executive Committee separately voted on only two. DNC term limits failed, 127–160. The Israel embargo passed, 160–151. When time expired, the remaining resolutions passed without individual debate or recorded votes, showing how committee approval can turn proposals into official NCDP positions almost automatically.
The stakes extend well beyond party resolutions and local elections. North Carolina is among Democrats’ best U.S. Senate pickup opportunities in 2026, with two August polls showing Roy Cooper leading Republican Michael Whatley by double digits. The former two-term governor must now navigate the party apparatus that activists are working to reshape. Democrats have not won at the Senate level since 2008.
Cooper rejected the Israel embargo despite public pressure from Democratic-affiliated groups. His campaign said he generally opposed withholding aid from Israel, a “critical ally.”
For now, that refusal hints at the limit of activist power. The DSA and its allies have yet to dictate the positions of North Carolina’s strongest state-level Democrat. They can, however, influence the Democratic platform, populate its committees, mobilize volunteers, and define the disputes that statewide candidates must answer.
The same machinery will surround future Democratic presidential campaigns vying for North Carolina’s electoral votes. Candidates will need activists at the doors, caucus leaders inside party meetings, and progressive voters measured by Elon. Its poll shows socialism has an audience — and the DSA is building the infrastructure to make that audience matter.