State Rep. Bill Cook, R-Beaufort, is mulling a run for the state Senate in District 1.
At present, Sen. Stan White, D-Dare, holds the District 1 seat, and White is running for re-election despite his worries the realigned district could be more Republican-friendly this year.
White has drawn an announced challenge from Chocowinity Republican Wayne Langston, and at least one other potential office-seeker — Cook excluded — is reported to be eyeing the office.
In an interview Monday, Cook made clear he’s been encouraged to run for Senate, partly because his newly reshaped House district poses difficulties for him as he attempts re-election.
“I really haven’t made up my mind for sure,” Cook said. “I may choose to run for the Senate. I don’t know.”
He said Greg Dority, chairman of the Beaufort County Republican Party, had spoken with him about a possible Senate run.
“He thinks I could do more for the county as a senator,” Cook commented. “And it might be as tough a race in one place as another.”
Cook said his inclination is to keep pushing for re-election to the House, but he confirmed the Senate job is tempting.
“The Senate, I’d be one of 50 instead of one of 120,” he said. “I think the opportunity to work for Beaufort (County) and influence events for Beaufort (County) and other counties, too, would be bigger. It’s just real hard to say what’s the best thing to do.”
Cook, who has kicked off his House re-election effort, said he might finalize his plans in the next couple of weeks.
The filing period for North Carolina offices runs from Feb. 13 through Feb. 29.
Cook and Dare County Democrat Paul Tine could be vying for pride of place in House District 6, provided no other House hopefuls come forward and Cook stays on his current course.
The district consumes basically all of Beaufort County north of the Pamlico River, including parts of Washington.
The district also takes in the whole of Hyde, Dare and Washington counties.
District 6, redrawn by GOP leaders during the legislative redistricting process last year, leans Republican in terms of voter registration and voting history, it’s said.
But, one key local activist pointed out, the district has less overall voting population in a carved-up part of Beaufort County than in Dare County, and the majorities in Hyde and Washington counties tend to vote Democratic.
Dare County has around 34,000 in population, as opposed to about 30,000 in the swath of Beaufort County that’s tucked into District 6, Herman Gaskins, a Washington attorney and Tine supporter, recently told the Daily News.
The numbers, and the voting tendencies of Hyde and Washington counties, could pose problems for incumbent Cook, Dority acknowledged.
Tine will make his campaign announcement Jan. 19 at the Beaufort County Board of Elections offices in Washington, related Ann Cherry, secretary of the Beaufort County Democratic Party.
This could be an acknowledgement of Tine’s strategy of reaching out across the area he needs to cover, and a nod to Beaufort County’s continuing, albeit diminished, numerical power in the district.
“To me, it’s not about Dare County or Beaufort County, it’s about how to make the state and region as strong as possible,” Tine said last month in a Daily News interview.
It’s the disadvantageous shape of District 6 — which has drawn the ire of local Republicans — that has Dority concerned. And this shape has led him to express his displeasure to GOP legislative leaders in Raleigh who, Dority said, have pledged to help local Republican candidates.
“The new maps in state House 6 present some difficult challenges for Cook’s re-election,” he said. “Primarily, we’ve got a situation where all of Dare County brings more voters to the table than Cook’s section of Beaufort County. Of course, we’ve got Hyde and Washington counties in it, which have caused us difficulty in the past.”
For her part, Cherry declined to say whether she’s confident the Democrats can make a dent in the GOP majority this year.
“I don’t do confidence; I just try to do work,” she said. “I like to say that we’re going to do enough work that (we) can (make a dent).”
Cook was elected in 2010, when he unseated longtime Rep. Arthur Williams, D-Beaufort. Williams recently jumped to the Republican Party, but his plans for 2012 remain unclear.