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By the time state Sen. Dan Blue realized he was being challenged, he was already in trouble.
An icon among North Carolina Democrats, the 75-year-old Blue had spent more than four decades in the General Assembly. In the 1990s, he’d become the state’s first (and still only) Black House Speaker. After being appointed to the state Senate in 2009, Blue was elected caucus leader in 2014.
Every two years, his fellow Democrats re-elected him without a challenge, even as they languished in deep minorities, often powerless to influence legislation or sustain vetoes. Blue expected the same thing to happen after the 2024 election, according to media reports and sources familiar with the events. The southeast Raleigh Democrat planned to serve a final term as minority leader before retiring.
But Sydney Batch, one of Blue’s deputies, had other plans. A Holly Springs attorney entering her third Senate term, Batch quietly assembled a leadership challenge. By the end of November, when Blue caught wind of her campaign, Batch was closing in on majority support.
Sources say that on December 2, the day of the leadership vote, Sen. Mujtaba Mohammed of Charlotte tried to negotiate a face-saving exit for Blue. The caucus’ elder statesman would stay on as minority leader through the 2025 long session, then step aside for Batch in 2026. Blue agreed. Knowing she had the election in hand, Batch did not.
Blue dropped out, and Batch became the new Senate minority leader—the first Black woman to lead a party in the General Assembly.
In interviews with The Assembly, Batch, 46, called Blue a mentor, saying she’d known him since she was 5 years old. But she thought the caucus was ready for a change, and Blue’s upcoming retirement offered an opportunity to transition—even if it wasn’t on his timeline.
“We have a lot of new members,” she said. “We have a lot of new energy. There are a lot of individuals who just want to, frankly, do some things that are different. And, you know, Sen. Blue—I am more bullish in a lot of ways than he is. It’s just a different style.”
Frequently profane (“She’s happy to tell people to fuck off,” one senator said) and unapologetically blunt (“You are never going to have a question about where you stand, or where she stands,” said Sen. Julie Mayfield, the caucus secretary), Batch promised a more assertive approach that took the fight to Republicans.
But the political realities haven’t changed. She’s taken over a caucus that’s been in the minority for 14 years and, thanks to gerrymandered legislative maps, has little hope of reclaiming power anytime soon.
Batch acknowledges that losing is self-perpetuating. It’s harder to raise money and recruit high-quality candidates. Keep losing, and you risk demoralized members accepting their permanent minority status, content to beg for scraps rather than seeing themselves as viable competitors.
Despite the odds, Batch seems to relish the battles ahead. “We can complain about the cards we’re dealt, or we can just play the hand we fucking have,” she said. “At this point, this is the hand we have. So you better figure out how to run a straight.”
‘Like the People’
Women usually have to be asked multiple times to run for office before they take the plunge. In Batch’s case, the third was the charm. The first came a decade ago, when a bar-trivia friend gave her name to party officials. She declined; she thought her sons, now 11 and 14, were too young. She turned down a second invitation for the same reason.
In 2017, when the progressive group Lillian’s List recruited her to run for the state House, Batch hesitated again. She didn’t want to run merely as part of the burgeoning resistance to President Donald Trump.
But she eventually warmed to the idea. She decided the legislature could use someone like her.
“We have a lot of new energy. There are a lot of individuals who just want to, frankly, do some things that are different.”
Sen. Sydney Batch
“Our government should look like the people,” Batch said. “Clearly, that is not the way that our legislature functions—not in age, not in ethnicity, not in gender. You have this one group who is controlling so much of everything that happens in our lives, and they don’t have any insight or reality or first-hand experience about what is actually happening.”
The Republican House majority had 76 members in 2017. All were white, and fewer than 20 were women.
Batch’s suburban southern Wake County district had long been a Republican stronghold, represented from 2003 to 2017 by the powerful conservative Rep. Paul Stam. After Stam retired, Republican Linda Hunt Williams won the seat, but she didn’t seek re-election in 2018.
The district became one of the Democrats’ top targets, and Batch was an ideal candidate: a smart, likable working mom with bright eyes, a sharp wit, and a quick smile that makes you feel like you’re in on a private joke.
She’d grown up in Chapel Hill, the child of medical doctors. Her stepfather, Dr. Allen Mask Jr., is best known as WRAL-TV’s Health Team physician. She was president of the Honor Society at Chapel Hill High School, and Batch also set the school record for the triple jump as a senior in 1997. It still stands today.
Like most of her five siblings, Batch went to college at UNC-Chapel Hill, where she also earned a master’s in social work and a law degree. In 2011, Batch started a law firm with her husband and a close friend, specializing in family law and child welfare cases.
Batch campaigned as a moderate, and Republicans struggled to tarnish her appeal. A conservative opposition research document said Batch had avoided taking concrete stands on controversial issues, though she’d posted liberal memes to her social media.
In a blue wave across the country, Batch won by fewer than 1,000 votes, helping Democrats break Republicans’ supermajority.
Three months before the 2018 election, she was diagnosed with breast cancer and underwent a mastectomy. Before she was sworn in, she had radiation. In May 2019, she underwent a second mastectomy. In the weeks that followed, then-House Speaker Tim Moore repeatedly rescheduled a vote to override Gov. Roy Cooper’s veto of a bill that required doctors to save infants who survived late-term abortions, a rare occurrence.
Democrats saw the bill as an attempt to erode abortion rights. Cooper said it “would criminalize doctors and other healthcare providers for a practice that simply does not exist.”
Democrats accused Moore of trying to catch Batch absent to improve the override’s chances. “[We’re] watching [Batch] sit on the House floor, obviously in pain, because of games that are being played,” state Democratic Rep. Ashton Clemmons told HuffPost.
Batch says Moore stopped after Republican Rep. Julia Howard of Mocksville, a fellow breast cancer survivor who supported the legislation, threatened to walk off the floor in solidarity. Howard confirmed Batch’s account to The Assembly.
“I have an outrageous amount of respect for Rep. Howard,” Batch said.
The House finally voted in early June. The override failed.
‘Authentically Me’
In 2020, as North Carolina narrowly backed Trump in the presidential election, Batch lost her swing district to Rep. Erin Paré by about 2,300 votes.
Batch says that defeat was instructive. She blames the loss on consultants who weren’t in touch with her district. They wanted her to run on Medicaid expansion, though her affluent constituents would only benefit indirectly. They also discouraged her from touting her concealed-carry permit and other aspects of her biography that “normalize me to my very white district,” she said.
Another hit came from a Republican effort to tie her to the “defund the police” movement. Most state Democratic candidates, including Batch, had signed a pledge from the activist group Future Now, which helped fund the party’s legislative campaign. The pledge contained a litany of generic liberal policy goals but did not mention defunding the police. Later, however, Future Now added a section to its website that called for reallocating police resources to community programs. Republicans attacked.
Batch was endorsed by the state Police Benevolent Association and thought defunding cops was a “stupid idea.” But the allegation stuck. “That actually hurt, being a Black woman in a predominantly white district in a town that prides themselves on being the safest town in all of North Carolina,” she said.
A turn of fate quickly pushed her off the sidelines. Just after being elected to his second term in the state Senate, Democrat Sam Searcy abruptly resigned. Cooper appointed Batch to replace him.
In 2022, Batch found herself in yet another tough election. The affluent Senate District 17 was known as the “soccer mom district,” and Batch campaigned as the embodiment of a moderate soccer mom. She talked about owning a gun and voting for tax cuts, along with her support for abortion rights. She won by almost six points.
“That ’20 race taught me that I have to just show up as who I am all the time, and people will love or hate it, but at least I am genuinely and authentically being me,” Batch said.
Blue made Batch deputy leader, letting her manage the caucus’ floor operations. Though Batch was only entering her third legislative term, Blue trusted her, according to a person familiar with the decision. He’d run in the same circles with her parents and had known her her whole life.
Batch’s biggest legislative contributions came in child welfare reform. In 2021, she helped craft a bipartisan bill that overhauled abuse, neglect, and dependency laws. Though she wasn’t a sponsor—“Politics prevents me from being on many bills,” she said—Cooper invited her to speak at the bill signing.
In 2023, Republicans redrew congressional and legislative districts after the state Supreme Court permitted partisan gerrymandering. Batch’s district turned dark blue, and last year, she coasted to re-election. For now, her biggest political threat is a primary.
That gave her the freedom to run for minority leader. Batch, who says she’s not planning to run for higher office, says her experience with close elections is an asset in her new role.
“If we’re going to be in a position where we win more seats, we have to figure out how to win them in areas that are not going to be just the urban centers of North Carolina,” she said. “We have to figure out how we talk to individuals who do not agree with us on every single thing.”
‘Appetite to Fight’
Senate Democrats are frustrated after the 2024 election. For the second straight legislative session, they find themselves in a superminority, unable to influence most major bills or sustain Democratic Gov. Josh Stein’s vetoes.
“People do get really tired and jaded. It’s exhausting to come into a building and just be told, ‘It doesn’t matter,’” Batch said. “But what I will also tell you is there’s so many that have a fire in their belly. There is an appetite for us to fight.”
Their frustration wasn’t new, however. Sources said that in recent years, including after the 2022 election, some Democrats pitched transition plans to nudge Blue aside. Blue rejected them.
Few Democrats are willing to criticize Blue directly. Some suggested that he wasn’t a strong fundraiser or hadn’t bolstered their political positions. One portrayed him as disengaged from the nuts and bolts of legislating. Mostly, interviews revealed a sense among some Democrats that Blue lacked urgency.
Other factors facilitated Batch’s challenge. The caucus looks more like Batch than Blue. Eight of its 20 members are under age 50, and nine are serving their first or second terms. More importantly for Batch, 13 are women, including seven Black women. They formed her base.
Blue did not respond to interview requests for this article.
Batch said she didn’t promise “to do it better. I’m just going to do it differently. What I hope in doing it differently is that we’ll have better outcomes, because we can’t continue to do the exact same thing.”
Not everything will change. Batch ran the caucus’ floor operations the last two years, and her strategy is unlikely to change. Though privately combative, she’s not prone to dramatic speeches or theatrics. She’s not a firebrand, allies say.
Instead, Batch says she wants to focus on empowering her members.
Sen. Val Applewhite of Cumberland County, who was a plaintiff in a key federal gerrymandering lawsuit, said no one asked her to work on redistricting in 2023. Batch has taken a different approach.
“She realizes that everybody brings talents, and she’s really drilling into that,” said Applewhite, a member of Batch’s leadership team. “She was intentional about knowing what our strengths are and pulling them out of us so they can be utilized. Since she has been elected leader, several times she’s already reached out to me and said, ‘Hey, Senator, what do you think?’”
She’s tasked other members with digging into legislation in their areas of expertise. Mayfield, who lives in Asheville, is taking the lead on Hurricane Helene relief. Sen. DeAndrea Salvador of Charlotte, a sustainability expert, is the caucus’ point person on energy.
“Sen. Blue wanted to support members to do what we wanted to do, and to spread the work around,” Sen. Graig Meyer of Chapel Hill told The Assembly. “Sen. Batch has been more directive so far.”
Batch says she thinks of her caucus like a track-and-field team. Each member needs to succeed at their individual event so the team can win the meet. That means allowing members to break with the party when it suits their district.
“We have to have more grace within our caucus and, frankly, in the political space, that when somebody doesn’t vote the same way, you just don’t assume that they are the worst person in the world and they’re going to hell,” she said.
Batch says some issues—abortion rights and voting rights, for example—are sacrosanct, and she also expects the caucus to vote together to sustain vetoes.
Batch also says she wants to ensure that all members have access to the same information before voting. She wants to open caucus meetings to state agencies and interest groups to lobby on legislation, something that didn’t happen before.
The most visible change will likely be the caucus’ media strategy. For years, Democrats say, Republican Senate leader Phil Berger has shaped news coverage by answering reporters’ questions after voting sessions. Democrats failed to mount an effective response.
This year, Batch plans to make Democrats available to the media after every vote. “I don’t think we’ve spoken to the press enough,” she said. “If we aren’t putting our narrative out there, it’s not the fault of North Carolinians to not know what that is.”
It won’t always be Batch making their case—in part because she’s not entirely comfortable with the media. But it’s also because she wants senators to speak to issues that affect their districts.
“We have to have more grace within our caucus and, frankly, in the political space, that when somebody doesn’t vote the same way, you just don’t assume that they are the worst person in the world and they’re going to hell.”
Sen. Sydney Batch
Sen. Natalie Murdock, the caucus’ deputy leader for communications, described the new messaging strategy as “a little bit bolder.” She says Democrats plan to target audiences across the state in press conferences, town halls, and on social media and radio. Murdock wants to highlight the caucus members’ backgrounds—rural and urban members, young parents, social workers, medical practitioners—to pitch Democrats as the party of “average, everyday North Carolinians.”
It remains to be seen whether Senate Democrats’ messaging can break through an environment in which Trump dominates headlines and Republicans dictate the statewide legislative agenda.
“It’s a general reality of politics that people have to hear something 10 times to start to believe it,” said Democratic pollster Tom Jensen. “I don’t even know necessarily that the message that Democrats in the legislature, or the Senate specifically, have had over the last decade has even been the wrong message. But it’s just really hard to tell everyone in the state something 10 times.”
No less daunting, Batch will also have to decide which pitches to swing at.
“If you want to get either out of the superminority or ever into a majority again, you have to make a clear contrast with what the majority is doing,” Meyer said. “We tend to try to fight every fight because every fight is worth it. But when you’re not in the majority, you can’t drive the narrative on every fight. So what is the unifying narrative that provides the contrast to what the Republicans are doing?”
‘Lose Loudly’
In Batch’s view, the problem isn’t that Democratic policies aren’t popular. Last November, Democratic candidates for the General Assembly won about 320,000 more votes than their Republican counterparts. The problem is gerrymandering.
“If you give me nonpartisan redistricting, I can fix all the problems in North Carolina,” Batch said. “Because what that would mean is that Democrats would be back in charge, and we can have nice things.”
Democrats began this session in the same precarious position they were in two years ago. Republicans have 30 of 50 seats in the Senate and 71 of 120 seats in the House—one vote shy of a supermajority.
“If you want to get either out of the superminority or ever into a majority again, you have to make a clear contrast with what the majority is doing.”
Sen. Graig Meyer
In 2023, Rep. Tricia Cotham defected, giving Republicans a supermajority in both chambers. Over the next two years, they overrode 29 consecutive Cooper vetoes. Democrats worry that history will repeat itself, as at least one House Democrat has already lashed out at a party “establishment” that he said turned him into a “villain.”
But even if no one switches parties, Republicans can try to peel off House Democratic votes by doling out incentives for their districts. They can also schedule override votes when Democrats are absent.
In that sense, Rep. Robert Reives II, the House minority leader, has a tougher task than Batch. If Reives can’t maintain caucus unity, Stein will be reduced to little more than a figurehead. (Reives told The Assembly that House Democrats will “toe the line when we need to.”)
Batch’s primary focus is the 2026 election. Democrats’ success will mostly be determined by the national mood. But in close races, candidate recruitment, fundraising, and messaging will matter.
“If you have the right candidate and the right funding, you can probably add another one or two points, and that can make the difference,” said Sen. Jay Chaudhuri of Wake County, the minority whip.
In a blue wave—like the 2018 midterm—Democrats believe they can pick up three Senate seats. Winning more would require them to win districts they lost by double digits in 2024.
While they try to chip away at the Republican majority, Senate Democrats insist that they can wield some influence over legislation over the next two years. Many bills aren’t partisan, and on those, Republicans often listen to Democrats’ perspectives. Republicans might also look for Democratic votes to pass gambling or medical marijuana bills, which Democrats see as more likely amid declining revenue projections and an uncertain economic climate.
But there’s little Senate Democrats can do to stop legislation like the immigration and anti-diversity, equity, and inclusion bills Berger has sponsored.
“We’re just gonna lose loudly,” Batch said.
‘Headache and Drama’
Batch won her leadership challenge by acclamation—meaning a voice vote with no objections—but multiple Democratic sources said that, at least among those closest to Blue, her victory obscures lingering skepticism and resentment.
Batch insisted the caucus is behind her.
“I know that there’s a lot of noise and headache and drama, because that’s, you know, clickbait to say that we are a divided caucus, and everybody’s so upset,” she said. “What I can tell you is I was voted in by acclamation, and everybody in the caucus was present, and everyone voted for me. And I think that our caucus is united.”
Republican leaders eyed Batch’s insurgency warily. According to multiple sources, Berger and Blue had a longstanding, comfortable relationship. But Republican leaders don’t know Batch.
Berger’s office did not respond to requests for comment. Neither did the offices of Sens. Paul Newton, the Republican majority leader, and Bill Rabon, chairman of the powerful Rules and Operations Committee.
After Democrats named Batch minority leader, Berger stripped her office of two positions. Batch now has three employees—a chief of staff, communications director, and legislative assistant—as well as two analysts she assigned to the Joint Legislative Commission on Government Operations.
At the same time, Berger allowed Blue, who is no longer in leadership, to keep his office and chief of staff. No other Democrat besides Batch has one.
In an email obtained by The Assembly through a public records request, Berger’s chief of staff, Kolt Ulm, told Batch’s office that staff sizes fluctuate. Batch’s “five partisan positions,” Ulm wrote, were “one more than Senator Blue had in his first biennium as minority leader, and two more than Senator Berger had in his first biennium as minority leader.” (Berger was elected minority leader in 2004.)
Berger also had Blue accompany him to the dais when he was formally elected president pro tempore at the beginning of the legislative session, a role traditionally reserved for the minority leader. And he denied Batch a seat on the Rules Committee, the first time the minority leader hasn’t been on that committee in more than 20 years, according to Batch’s office.
‘Always Seems Impossible’
Visitors to Batch’s small, harshly lit, windowless office on the first floor of the Legislative Building—another gift from Berger, she said—are greeted with a placard bearing a quote from Shirley Chisholm, the first Black woman elected to Congress: “Tremendous amounts of talent are lost to our society because that talent wears a skirt.”
It’s both a nod to the significance of her position and a subtle act of defiance in response.
“Put me in whatever office,” Batch said. “I’ll make the best of it. At the end of the day, I’m here to do the job, and I’m very proud to be the first woman to lead a Democratic caucus. That’s why I put in the front of my office the quote by Shirley Chisholm. I have faced more challenges as a woman than as a Black person in this political space and this leadership role.”
A veteran former legislator told The Assembly that these challenges might stem from Republican leaders viewing Batch as an unknown.
“Berger doesn’t give away trust,” the former legislator said. “The question is, is she gonna be willing to put in the time and effort to build relationships with those guys?”
Batch said she told Berger she’ll be “open and transparent on the ways we can work together, and I hope he’ll do the same.” She said she hopes her relationship with Berger warms with time, but the onus shouldn’t be entirely on her.
“I can’t make someone give me the respect they’ve given someone else, and the slights that have occurred since I’ve become leader are very obvious,” Batch said. “Now, do they bother me? No. I mean, I’m not losing sleep.”
Ultimately, Batch’s leadership will be judged on whether she can make Senate Democrats relevant again. The first test is breaking the supermajority next year, but her caucus doesn’t want to stop there.
Another quote that hangs on Batch’s office wall, from Nelson Mandela, perhaps best reflects her aspirations.
“It always seems impossible until it’s done.”
Jeffrey Billman reports on politics and the law for The Assembly. Email him at jeffrey@theassemblync.com.