Did NC congressman help expand ECU’s Brody School of Medicine?
Rep. Don Davis faced criticism in 2020 as a state senator, after siding with the governor over the state’s budget that cost East Carolina University funding to expand its school of medicine.
So last month, when Davis said during a town hall that he worked to expand the Brody School of Medicine at ECU, it caught the attention of Republicans, who are closely monitoring his every move in hopes of flipping his congressional district red in the 2024 election.
The National Republican Congressional Committee accused Davis in a written statement of taking credit for funding ECU even though, they say, he voted against it.
“Vulnerable Democrat Don Davis has been caught taking credit for funding that he voted against while in the State Senate,” according to a statement from Delanie Bomar, spokeswoman for the National Republican Congressional Committee.
Bomar states that Davis supported Gov. Roy Cooper’s 2019 veto of the state budget, including ECU’s funding. And she added, funding for the medical school was one of his campaign promises.
“Don Davis is a classic two-stepping politician who says one thing but does another,” Bomar said, in a statement to McClatchy. “Whether it’s in the state Senate or in Congress, Davis’ allegiances are clearly with his Democrat bosses, not eastern North Carolina.”
Hannah Spengler, Davis’ chief of staff. said in her own statement that Davis “is a passionate advocate for eastern North Carolina.
“He voted in favor of Senate Bill 105, 2021 Appropriations Act, and was appointed as one of only four Democrat conferees and engaged in budget negotiations,” she said. “As the most senior Democrat, Congressman Davis signed off on the final budget report, which included funding for the new East Carolina University Brody School of Medicine.
So who is right?
The budget vote
It is true that in January 2020, key Senate Democrats, including Davis, said they would vote to maintain Gov. Roy Cooper’s veto of the budget.
Because of that, however, it was never brought to a vote in the Senate.
Six months earlier, in June 2019, Cooper vetoed the budget, saying it “prioritized the wrong things.”
Chief among Cooper’s complaints about the budget was that it failed to include Medicaid expansion, gave teachers limited pay raises, failed to restore master’s degree pay for career educators or invest $80 million over two years for schools to promote student mental health and school safety.
The House overrode the governor’s veto on Sept. 11, 2019.
But the Senate wasn’t so easily moved.
Davis had originally voted for the budget. But after Cooper’s veto, Davis was caught between his party’s leader, and people in his community who wanted him to vote for the budget because of the funds at ECU.
Expanding the Brody School of Medicine was estimated to create an annual $300 million economic impact and 1,700 more jobs in the state.
Additionally, ECU is ranked in the top 10% of medical schools that train physicians who stay in-state, as well as the top 10% for training Black and Native American physicians.
Opinion pieces from college leaders targeted Davis in local newspapers asking him to support the veto override. The Greenville City Council passed a resolution in support of the budget. And once it became clear that the Senate Democrats would not be moved, radio host Henry Hinton had Davis on his program, Talk of the Town, and told him he “lost his mind.”
“I don’t understand how anyone who is an elected official for this community, could behave the way you behaved yesterday and not have done anything and everything in your power to get this Brody School of Medicine, and this $220 million for your district,” Hinton told Davis on air.
Davis stood with his party, and helped keep Cooper’s veto in place.
“My position, as of right now, would (be) sustaining the veto,” Davis told McClatchy at the time. He said they needed to continue negotiating teacher pay, school construction and franchise tax cuts.
Behind the scenes
The General Assembly survived off mini-budgets until November 2021, when Cooper signed into law a new budget that earmarked $215 million for the Brody School of Medicine to expand. Davis did vote to pass that budget.
And Davis was working beyond the budget to get funding for the school.
Earlier, in 2019, Davis proposed a bill that would earmark $14.3 million to ECU to develop plans for construction of a new building at the medical school. The bill died in committee.
In January 2021, he sponsored a new bill to provide $215 million to ECU to expand that Brody school of medicine. That bill ultimately became part of the budget.
Then, in Nov. 2022, Davis’s constituents voted for him to represent them in Congress, after former Rep. G.K. Butterfield retired.
Maintaining status quo
VoteView, a website tracking the votes of members of Congress, shows that Davis has a 95% attendance record in Congress and has voted with his party 88% of the time. The rest of North Carolina’s Democrats vote with their party at least 94% of the time.
Nearly a year after Davis took office, state lawmakers redrew North Carolina’s 14 congressional districts, which are currently split evenly between Democrats and Republicans. The new districts give Republicans 10 easily winnable districts, and Democrats just three. That leaves one true swing district that leans slightly red.
And that’s Davis’s.
The NRCC wants to maintain its slim majority in the U.S. House next session. Republicans currently have five more members than Democrats, with six vacancies.
In February 2023, the NRCC named Davis as vulnerable in the 2024 election and began targeting him with negative news releases and paying close attention to his every move.
He is facing off against Army veteran Laurie Buckhout, a Republican who lives in Edenton.
The general election is scheduled for Nov. 5.
NC Reality Check is an N&O series holding those in power accountable and shining a light on public issues that affect the Triangle or North Carolina. Have a suggestion for a future story? Email realitycheck@newsobserver.com
