Our election night

Story + photos

I turned off my phone and set it on the bedside table in our hotel room.

Marisa kept hers on. Our two boys, Owen and Haden, were with us in the room. Avery, our daughter, was bouncing around the hotel somewhere with my sister and her little cousin.

I had spent all day greeting voters at different polling sites, and now we were waiting for the results.

I had decided not to sit in the make-shift war room with all the laptops and staffers hitting refresh every few seconds. That place was a stress factory. No need for that.

I also knew that if I kept my phone on, my friends were going to stress-text me every few minutes and that was also not great.

I just needed to relax, be grateful for everything our team had accomplished, and wait patiently for the news that we had either won or lost.

I asked one member of my team to be the point person. He was supposed to knock on our door when he had news.

At about 10pm, he knocked.

The situation was okay, but not great. We were only up by 0.3%, with lots of votes left to count. I said thanks and he left.

I sat with Marisa and we were both quiet. It felt like a long time.

Then Marisa’s phone rang. It was my point person, who couldn’t reach me because my phone was off - and he had news.

It was over. We won.

A wave of relief and joy hit. Marisa and I hugged. Wediditwediditwedidit.

Not only had we won, but we were on track to win by a good margin - about 3%. By North Carolina standard, that’s pretty solid.

My opponent called. He was exceptionally gracious, which I appreciated and reciprocated.

Avery came up to our room and we all hugged as a family. Just a wonderful moment for the five of us. 

Then we all got in the elevator and went up a few floors where my campaign team was waiting in another room. Owen ran down the hall in front of us, knocked on the door, and yelled that we had won. I followed into the room behind him, gave a bunch of hugs and told my team how amazing they were.

After a few minutes, someone on my team leaned over to me and whispered, “Speech time.”

I had written a draft but it felt like bad luck to spend too much time on it, so it was pretty rough. So we all crammed into a few elevators, went down to the lobby and found a side room where I could quickly finish writing. 

Then our family was scooped up and ushered through the hotel kitchen. We stopped at a stage door that led to the ballroom. We collected ourselves for a moment, and I explained to Owen and Avery that we were all about to be on TV so they couldn’t run around on stage. Owen asked, “How many speeches are you giving tonight?” And this was my answer:

Then we walked out on stage.

I gave a short speech (which you can watch here), but the best part was this moment captured by Ethan Hyman, a photographer at the News & Observer:

After the speech, I did a few quick interviews:

I approved a quick email to go out to supporters to let them know we had won:

And then Marisa had the idea to knock out our annual family photo, given that we were all dressed up. So here’s what we got:

Then I said goodnight to my team, checked in on a few more races, and we all went to bed.

The next morning, we had breakfast with some family who had come in from out of town, and then Marisa and I packed everything back in the car and we drove home to Charlotte.

The next day, I told Owen and Avery that I would take them to do anything they wanted.

This was Owen’s pick:

And this was Avery’s:

And now I’m on a plane, flying back to D.C. for the first time in seven weeks. We will all meet on the House floor soon. Some have lost, some have won, and obviously massive political changes are headed our way. I’ll have more to tell you about that experience next week.

And then - and for a good while after - I’ll have much to tell you about the transition to Attorney General. That work is already underway, and I think you’re going to find it really interesting. 

My plan is to continue to use this newsletter to give you an inside look at what this work is like, and no matter how you tend to vote, I think it will be of service to you.

But for now, thank you. You just helped us win the most expensive Attorney General race in American history. 50,000 of you made a contribution. That’s an overwhelming level of support. My gratitude can’t fit neatly into a paragraph. You were crucial in helping us accomplish a massive goal that will make a difference to our entire state, and I’m just very thankful.

More soon, and wishing you all the best,

Jeff