Greeting all. I’m excited to introduce you to an inspiring leader running for re-election in North Carolina, Supreme Court Justice Anita Earls.
As a reminder North Carolina Dems are in a multi-cycle campaign to win back the Supreme Court, pass fair maps, and unrig one of the most outrageous gerrymanders in the country - all following the Wisconsin model. Here’s NC Dem Chair Anderson Clayton in a recent interview talking about this critical effort:
In 2026, we have another Supreme Court seat up, Justice Anita Earls, the only Black woman currently serving statewide on the bench in North Carolina. She’s fantastic — a former civil rights attorney, founder and former executive director of the Southern Coalition for Social Justice. She understands, better than almost anyone, exactly what’s at threat right now from this administration and the authoritarianism we’re seeing.
And in 2028, we'll have the opportunity to flip three more Republican-held seats on the North Carolina Supreme Court — three-for-three, if you will — which would give us the ability to reverse partisan and racial gerrymandering in the state. Democrats have had to play defense a lot over the last year and a half as Republicans have gerrymandered states across the country. We want to go on offense. North Carolina is how you think long-term about making sure that when Democrats take back control of Congress in '26, we don't lose it again in '28, and we keep it after that. I'm really excited we're on the ground doing everything we can for 2026 — but we're also looking at '28, 2030, 2032, and beyond here in North Carolina.
Here’s Justice Earls in our conversation:
I am currently the Senior Associate Justice on the North Carolina Supreme Court. I was first elected in 2018. We have a seven-member court. We are all elected statewide, and we are elected in partisan elections. Prior to being elected, I was a civil rights attorney for 30 years, litigating voting rights cases, employment discrimination, school desegregation. All sorts of types of claims and working with communities to try to get us closer to equal justice under the law. That's been my goal. That's my the reason why I'm on the court – an understanding that our state constitution is a very important source of protecting our rights, and that the federal courts were stepping away from from that role. So things like overturning Roe v. Wade, saying they won't address partisan gerrymandering, most recently making it extremely difficult to enforce the Voting Rights Act. These were all ways that the U.S. Supreme Court has left it to the states to protect our rights.
In 2024 we helped re-elect Allison Riggs to the North Carolina Supreme Court. This year we need to rally for Justice Earls by contributing to our Winning North Carolina Fund, which splits a contribution evenly among Roy Cooper for U.S. Senate, the North Carolina Democratic Party and its powerhouse chair Anderson Clayton, and Justice Earls. The winds are blowing our way in North Carolina this year but we need to make sure Justice Earls has enough money in these closing days to keep her name in front of late-breaking voters so we don’t have what’s called drop off - when people vote for Roy Cooper and others higher up on the ballot and leave the Supreme Court race blank.
How urgent is keeping this Supreme Court seat in North Carolina? As Justice Earls reminds us when we lost three North Carolina Supreme Court seats in 2022 the new GOP led court allowed an outrageous gerrymander to go through. As a result the North Carolina delegation to Congress went from 7 Dem and 7 GOP to 4 Dem and 10 GOPers. If we had those three extra seats today Hakeem Jeffries would be Speaker and we would control the House. So losing the North Carolina Supreme Court in 2022 helped keep us from controlling the House - and blocking Trump’s agenda these past two years. So, yes, it matters!
More from Justice Earls:
I've had the challenge of explaining to folks what it means to run as a Democrat, but to rule fair, impartially and independently. And actually, I do point to the justices on the Wisconsin Supreme Court because I think they are incredible models for how you do that. They have demonstrated that since they have now been in the majority on that court. They've demonstrated very principled ways of addressing the controversies that come before them. And Justice Riggs and I, in our past careers and in our commitments going forward, we want people to understand that, yes, we are running, and I am proud to be a Democrat. I believe in the Democratic Party's values. But that doesn't mean I'm going to rule the way the Democratic Party asked me to in any particular case. When I'm a judge, it's my job to be impartial, to be independent, to apply the law fairly and equally to everyone. And I have a career of examples where that's what I've done.
Here’s one of our favorite ads from the Earls For Justice campaign:
Friends, watch this interview with a principled and inspiring leader, share it with others, hit like so more will see, consider supporting Justice Earls today, and keep working hard everyone. For we have a country to save, and elections like this one in North Carolina to win, together! - Simon
Justice Anita Earls is a civil rights attorney and experienced jurist who is running for reelection to the North Carolina Supreme Court in 2026.
Her values of justice, equality, and fairness for all were born of the struggle she experienced growing up in a mixed-race family at a time when interracial marriages were illegal in most of the country.
These values and experiences guided Justice Earls’ career choices, leading her to fight for the rights of ordinary citizens across North Carolina in a wide range of civil rights cases. For over 30 years, she stood alongside people whose right to vote was denied, people who were mistreated at work, and the parents of children who were being denied equal educational opportunities, seeking equal justice under the law in state and federal courtrooms.
President Clinton appointed her to be a Deputy Assistant Attorney General in the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice. Returning to North Carolina, she worked alongside Julius Chambers at the UNC Center for Civil Rights and, in 2007, founded the Southern Coalition for Social Justice, a nonprofit legal advocacy organization that partners with historically marginalized communities across the South. After serving as the organization’s executive director for 10 years, Justice Anita Earls was elected to the North Carolina Supreme Court in 2018.
Now, as the only African American member of the Court, Justice Earls has continued to demonstrate her steadfast dedication to upholding the Constitution and protecting the rights and freedoms of all North Carolinians – including access to healthcare, a sound basic public education, a clean environment, fairness in the marketplace, and the equal right to vote.
Justice Earls lives in Durham, North Carolina with her husband Charles Walton. She has two sons and three grandchildren.
