Meet Roy Cooper
As Governor, Roy Cooper led North Carolina to be one of the fastest-growing states in the nation with a good quality of life, a strong education system, more health care coverage, and better-paying jobs. The state was named the best state for business three of the past four years.
Cooper was born and raised in Nash County, North Carolina, where he attended public schools and worked summers on the farm before earning undergraduate and law degrees from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
He represented everyday people and small businesses while practicing law in Rocky Mount, North Carolina, where he and his wife Kristin raised three daughters. His mother was a public-school teacher, which helped cement his deep commitment to public education.
For years, he taught Sunday School and tutored students in local public schools. Cooper entered public service after being elected to the legislature, where he worked to raise teacher pay and strengthen law enforcement, and wrote North Carolina’s first children’s health insurance initiative.
After being elected Attorney General, Cooper prosecuted criminals and protected North Carolina families, small businesses, and seniors for four consecutive terms. He oversaw a sharp decrease in crime and fought for consumers by putting scammers and predatory lenders out of business and standing up to the drug companies and big banks, getting billions of dollars back to North Carolinians.
Elected Governor in 2016 and re-elected in 2020, both years that Donald Trump carried North Carolina, Cooper’s mission was to ensure that all North Carolinians had the opportunity to be better educated, healthier, and more prosperous for generations to come.
Governor Cooper worked to create thousands of new jobs and worked with members of both parties to enact hundreds of bipartisan bills. He succeeded in getting a bipartisan agreement to expand Medicaid, which in early 2025 has already brought health care to more than 650,000 North Carolinians. He enacted a plan to incentivize hospitals to relieve more than $4 billion of existing medical debt for 2 million eligible North Carolinians and prevent new debt. He also focused on boosting public education, tackling the opioid crisis, revitalizing rural communities and making sure North Carolinians have the training to fill the better-paying jobs that require new skills.
Governor Cooper believes that if we work together, we can build a North Carolina that works for everyone.
