Disgraced GOP operative drove voting place cuts in North Carolina

By Andrew Childers, Natalie Hausmann

Newly appointed members of the North Carolina State Board of Elections, from left, Jeff Carmon, Francis De Luca, Stacy "Four" Eggers, Siobhan O'Duffy Millen and Bob Rucho, take their oaths of office at the Dobbs Building in Raleigh, N.C., on Wednesday, May 7, 2025 (AP Photo/Gary D. Robertson)

A disgraced GOP operative who resigned from his North Carolina election oversight role in July was a driving force behind efforts to curtail voting opportunities in the state, local election administrators suggested Thursday.

Dallas Woodhouse’s name came up repeatedly as the North Carolina State Board of Elections reviewed counties’ early voting plans. Woodhouse resigned from the State Auditor’s office after texts revealed how he pressured counties to change early voting plans to benefit Republicans.

Despite his departure, several county-level Republican voting officials said Thursday that Woodhouse was behind their plans to limit Sunday voting and oppose polling sites on college campuses.

Lee County election board member Jay DeLancy (R), who is also a self-proclaimed election integrity activist, said it was Woodhouse who suggested throwing out Sunday voting in an unprompted phone call.

“I honestly had not thought of getting rid of Sunday until he planted that seed,” DeLancy said of Woodhouse. “I know it’s an unpopular decision, but my Christian faith says, and that the wall of the court outside our board of elections up there in blazing big letters, it says ‘In God We Trust.’”

Ultimately, the state board reduced Sunday voting in Lee County to three hours after hearing public comments in support of keeping the weekend balloting.

Woodhouse’s name came up again while discussing plans for a voting site at Western Carolina University in Jackson County. Woodhouse had pressured the county election chair to vote against it despite bipartisan support at the county level.

“I’ve been asked to, and I’m going to,” Bill Thompson, the county’s election board chair, said in June. Thompson did not join his colleagues at Thursday’s meeting.

Despite Thompson’s objections, the state board voted in favor of the college site in a win for student voters.

Auditor Dave Boliek, the highest-ranking elected Republican in North Carolina, had appointed Woodhouse as his liaison to local boards of elections after the state legislature stripped Democratic Gov. Josh Stein of his oversight of the election process. Woodhouse had pressured local election officials to push explicitly partisan early voting plans to boost Republicans.

Woodhouse also has a long history of opposing polling places on college campuses and Sunday voting, which is popular with Black voters.