Who is the most endangered incumbent in the United States right now? Up there in the danger zone is Rep. Wiley Nickel, a freshman member of Congress from the Research Triangle area of North Carolina. In fact, his district is now rated “Safe Republican” by the three different election rating agencies: Cook-Solid, Inside Elections-Likely, and Sabato- Safe for a Republican. Daily Kos Elections says Nickel is the 8th most vulnerable Democrat currently.
Not many gave Wiley Nickel a chance of winning a marginal swing seat in a midterm election with President Biden in the White House. Nickel discussed with Lawrence O’Donnell on MSNBC why he felt he defeated his MAGA challenger, Bo Hines. He won his seat by a 52-48 margin, a close result but still comfortable.
So what has changed since 2022? Simply put, the North Carolina Supreme Court allowed the Congressional districts to be redrawn, and the North Carolina state legislature obliged, drawing three Democratic incumbents into heavily GOP districts and endangering a fourth one.
That district was redrawn to boot out Democratic U.S. Rep. Jeff Jackson, who may run for attorney general instead. U.S. Democratic Rep. Wiley Nickel was also drawn out of his congressional district, as was Democratic Rep. Kathy Manning. Another Democrat, Rep. Don Davis, had his Eastern North Carolina district drawn to be more competitive.
He is now located in a district Trump won by double digits, which is a nearly insurmountable hole in these polarized times. I’ll give Nickel credit, he hasn’t bailed out yet like some of his colleagues have. He knows he is facing long odds of getting re-elected and will make a decision on his future by December 15, 2023. Until then, I will treat him as running for re-election.
Today, the spotlight is on North Carolina’s problem solver, Rep. Wiley Nickel!
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Rep. Wiley Nickel (North Carolina-13)
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Biography: Who is Wiley Nickel?
So how did the whole “Wiley” nickname begin? Nickel tells all to CSPAN!
George W. Nickel III was born in California, near Bakersfield. He was an heir to the vast Nickel Family LLC farming empire. But Nickel was destined to chart a different path than the life of a farmer. He went to Tulane University from 1994-1998, and got a BA in Political Science. He got his law degree from Pepperdine University from 2002-2005, and eventually would develop a thriving law practice.
Nickel has been working behind the scenes on political campaigns ever since Al Gore’s Vice Presidency and 2000 campaign. He worked as a part of the advance staff, which scouts areas and sets up political events for the candidates. He continued in this capacity for the Howard Dean campaign in 2004 and for Obama’s campaign in 2008. Even when he moved to North Carolina in 2009, he still was part of the Obama team. He was also a consultant for the DNC in 2010-2011.
Nickel has run for office multiple times before being elected to Congress. He started by running for a state senate seat in California’s Central Valley.
Nickel, a moderate Democrat, is a political newcomer going up against an incumbent Republican state senator in a conservative district that sprawls from Merced across the coastal mountains to Salinas and Watsonville in Monterey County.
Ordinarily that would make him a sacrificial lamb, but the race has attracted a great deal of attention from political professionals who say Nickel may have a realistic shot at winning.
That's because Democratic voters outnumber Republicans 46 percent to 37 percent in the district. In the June primary election, where both men were unopposed for their party nominations, Nickel got 2,251 more votes than Denham.
It turned out that Nickel did not have a good chance of winning that race, as he lost it by approximately a 60%-40% result. But that did not dissuade Nickel from running again once he relocated to North Carolina. He ran for the state senate in 2018 and helped break the GOP super-majority by winning 66% of the vote. He got similar margins in his 2020 re-election bid as well.
Wiley Nickel in a 2022 campaign ad.
Nickel had an inkling that North Carolina would gain a district in 2020 redistricting, and that another one would be drawn in the Research Triangle. He started his campaign for “District 00” in late 2020 in order to make sure he could raise funds and get endorsements.
Nickel, a 44-year old Democratic lawyer heading into his second term representing western Wake County, filed paperwork on Friday forming an exploratory committee to run for Congress in 2022.
A state senator filing paperwork to explore a campaign might seem like ho-hum news, except that Nickel filed to try out that bid in the mysterious “House District 00.” That district, of course, doesn’t exist, and the district where Nickel lives is already represented by a Democrat. But it wasn’t a typo, Nickel assured Policy Watch.
He’s placing an early bet that when North Carolina redistricting is all said and done, the legislature (or courts, if it comes to that) will have drawn a brand new congressional district right in his backyard because of surrounding population growth. North Carolina is expected to gain a district as a result of the 2020 census, Election Data Services has projected.
It took the North Carolina Supreme Court to draw fairer maps, but Nickel’s gamble on “District 00” paid off, as he ran for the swing 13th district and won. He talked to Daily Kos for The Downballot about running for Congress and his victory.
Beard: Forecasters rated your race somewhere between a toss-up up to even likely Republican. And, of course, I'm in the middle, at “lean Republican.” So, it definitely looked like outside observers thought it was going to be very tough for you to win, but you ended up winning 52 to 48. So, obviously, very close, but a clear victory. So, take us through that election day and election night as those results were coming in, what you were thinking and feeling, and when you knew you had actually won the election.
Nickel: ...But our race... Cook Report, I think, is one of the good places where you can really get a good idea of where places stand, and they had our races at toss-up the whole time. But you had places like FiveThirtyEight.com who gave me a 20% chance of winning on election day. They had some goofy stuff with how they looked at these races that I didn't like, but it was one that most people didn't think, up until the end, we could win. It's an off-year election; it's a Republican seat. But for us, you just have to take a leap of faith and believe in North Carolina.
And we just knew if we gave voters a choice in our race, they make the right choice. But it was amazing. We had no idea how it was going to go. A 3-point win was a huge win for us in this district. I think it was something close to 9,000 votes. So it was out of the recount range. We knew we had it on election night. And just one of those amazing nights because we got to send a message. Anyone who works in politics, all they want is to have one chance to send a message about where we are as a country, women's rights, on MAGA extremism. And we got to send that message with the win, which was really the best part.
If you want to get to know Rep. Wiley Nickel on a personal level, I recommend listening to or reading the transcript of the whole podcast!
Wiley Nickel the Problem Solver
Rep. Wiley Nickel is in three groups that signify he is in Washington to solve problems in a bipartisan manner, instead of being an ideological warrior. He is a member of the New Democratic Coalition, the Problem Solvers Caucus, and the Blue Dog Coalition. He explains what prompted him to join these types of groups upon entering Congress.
Three freshmen U.S. Reps. have joined the Problem Solvers Caucus in Congress.
Democrats Don Davis (NC-01) and Wiley Nickel (NC-13) and Republican Chuck Edwards (NC-11) officially joined the group, which now has over 60 members of both parties. Twenty-four new members joined the caucus this term.
“I’m excited to join a group of colleagues who are focused on delivering real solutions to the kitchen-table issues that affect the day-to-day lives of Western North Carolinians,” said Edwards in a statement.
Nickel added “I look forward to working with Democrats and Republicans on the Problem Solvers Caucus to get things done for the American people.”
“Since its inception, the Blue Dog Coalition has consistently been at the forefront of finding pragmatic, bipartisan policy solutions on important issues facing the American people,” said Congressman Nickel. “I look forward to working under the leadership of co-chairs Golden, Gluesenkamp Perez, and Peltola and with my Blue Dog Coalition colleagues to deliver common sense solutions for the people of North Carolina’s 13th District.”
The Blue Dogs aren’t the same troublesome caucus they were in the Obama years. They’ve eschewed that branding and are now focused on different matters.
The new crop of Blue Dogs believes they serve an important role within the Democratic Party, both as bipartisan dealmakers and foils to the Donald Trump-backed candidates that many of them knocked off.
“We defeated some pretty weird extremists to be here,” said Gluesenkamp Pérez, an auto body shop owner who upset a pro-Trump Republican in a red district to win her first term. “I don’t know that much about the Blue Dogs’ history. I like who’s in it now, and I like the work we’re doing keeping weirdos out of Congress and trying to fix the things that keep people up at night.”
Being a part of these groups means being open to working with the GOP on critical issues, including keeping the government functioning at a basic level. Nickel commented on the need to isolate the right-wing extremists that are throwing sand in the gears in the House.
Some centrist Democrats told Axios they would be open to working with Republicans to pass rule votes – similar to how 52 of them voted to save the debt ceiling deal last month after 29 Republicans voted against advancing the bill to a final vote.
Rep. Wiley Nickel (D-N.C.) said nobody has reached out to him about the idea, but "I'd certainly be open to shifting the balance of power more towards the center."
"I've always felt that if you have a group of incredibly far-right extremists who have no interest in governing, then folks in the center need to do what's right to make sure we can pass a budget and move legislation and do the peoples' business," Nickel said.
Rep. Wiley Nickel speaks at a news conference deriding the GOP tax plan.
Nickel is on one committee in Congress — the House Committee on Financial Services. This committee doesn’t produce the drama that other committees can produce, but it does give him insight into how to regulate financial investments. Crypto has turned into the wild west, and Nickel has called for bipartisan legislation to regulate it.
Nickel has quite a few priorities in Congress, such as defending democracy, gun safety, and taking care of his rural constituents.
As an example of his goal of defending democracy, Nickel is a fan of undoing gerrymandering and of voters picking their politicians instead of the other way around. He recently wrote an op-ed in the Raleigh area news to reinforce this point.
Last year, North Carolina voters sent seven Democrats and seven Republicans to the United States House of Representatives under fair, court-drawn maps for our 50/50 state. North Carolina’s 13th District, which I'm proud to represent in Congress, is the state's only true swing district.
Now, the state legislature is set to draw new maps for 2024. As this process begins to play out, it's imperative that North Carolinians have a fair shot to make their voices heard at the ballot box and deserve fair maps and equal representation.
I’ve seen the first-hand effects of partisan gerrymandering. In nearly every state, partisan gerrymandering has been used as a tool by politicians to manipulate electoral outcomes with almost surgical precision.
This leads to hyper-partisanship, increased polarization and disenfranchises voters. It’s the reason why we have such chaos and confusion in Congress with extreme MAGA Republicans fighting a civil war with conservative Republicans and booting the former Speaker of the House.
In Congress there’s a lot we can do to make it easier for people to vote and participate in our democracy. It starts with passing the John Lewis Voting Rights Act and the Freedom to Vote Act.
These common sense bills would end partisan gerrymandering, expand voting by mail, protect early voting, help get big money out of our elections, combat dark money, support election integrity and make additional reforms to improve ballot access.
In terms of gun safety, Nickel advocates for common-sense safety measures like universal background checks, safe storage laws, closing the loophole that allows domestic abusers to buy guns, and a ban on high-capacity magazines.
Rep. Jared Moskowitz organized a second tour of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in mid November. Rep. Wiley Nickel joined a bipartisan delegation to examine the terrible scenes there.
“Touring the site of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting and meeting victims’ families was an experience I’ll never forget,” said Congressman Wiley Nickel. “There’s no way to describe what it felt like to see the bullet-riddled, bloodstained classrooms and hallways that remain frozen in time. We owe it to each victim and family impacted by this tragedy to stop the epidemic of gun violence plaguing our nation. It’s important that we address this head-on and work together to keep our children, teachers, and fellow Americans safe.”
Nickel has been looking after his rural constituents by giving them more access to capital for farming. He teamed up with Iowa Rep. Randy Feenstra to introduce the ACRE Act.
On Wednesday, U.S. Representatives Wiley Nickel (NC-13) and Randy Feenstra (IA-04) introduced the Access to Credit for our Rural Economy (ACRE) Act of 2023, which would benefit American families, farmers, and rural communities nationwide by giving greater flexibility to more financial institutions to offer affordable lines of credit to rural and agricultural borrowers.
“The ACRE Act will help lower mortgage costs for rural communities and enable farmers in North Carolina to have greater access to credit through community banks,” said Rep. Nickel. “I’m glad to partner with Rep. Feenstra on this common sense, bipartisan solution to give rural communities in North Carolina, Iowa, and throughout the country a fair shot at economic opportunity and success.”
“Over the last few years, rising interest rates and record inflation have increased operating costs for our farmers, stifled young producers from entering agriculture, and prevented families in rural America from securing a home mortgage,” said Rep. Feenstra. “We need to give our main street lenders much-needed flexibility to offer agricultural and home loans at affordable rates to grow our rural communities. I’m proud to work with Rep. Wiley Nickel to ensure that our family farmers have access to the capital they need to remain profitable, and our families have the financial support they need to plant their roots in rural Iowa.”
Despite his membership in moderate caucuses and a moderate persona, Nickel has been a reliable vote for the Democratic Party on most issues. He has voted with his colleagues about 95% of the time, and has a rare (for a swing district) Progressive Punch score of an A in spite of his moderation.
Nickel has called for President Biden to invest in North Carolina for his re-election campaign. "If the campaign goes all in, we can win North Carolina [in 2024], but we need that support and that investment," Nickel said he told the president. "The votes are there; we've just got to get them out to vote."" "And Rep. Nickel, who won his race in 2022 by 3 percentage points, is counting on it. "I'm just trying to get reelected," said Nickel. "If they go all-in on getting folks out to vote, running a really good coordinated campaign ... that's worth 3 points, you know, for someone like me."
The head of the NC Democratic Party, Anderson Clayton, concurs. She also joined The Downballot to talk up North Carolina in 2024.
Clayton: Yeah. I would love anybody, even for my out-of-state folks, to be looking at North Carolina as the place of opportunity for 2024. And to put your time, energy, and talent and treasure is what I like to call your donation. You can go to the ncdp.org to either donate or sign up to volunteer with us.
Rep. Wiley Nickel, if he chooses to run in North Carolina’s 13th district, is unlikely to win. If a win does happen, it would be through his pragmatic moderation and membership in caucuses such as the Blue Dogs and Problem Solvers and hard work put in connecting to the citizens of the district. Facing a MAGA opponent would be necessary as well. At the very least, Nickel will cause the GOP to spend money to oust him — money that could be spent elsewhere.
Rep. Wiley Nickel has the political pedigree to run statewide, or return to behind the scenes work advising political campaigns, or even dropping back down to the state legislature. He will continue to solve problems no matter what he chooses to do after 2024.
Hopefully, this isn’t the end of Rep. Wiley Nickel’s political aspirations!
New Faces in Congress is a diary series meant to highlight our new and diverse members of Congress in the Democratic Party. These 36 House freshmen range from political neophytes to seasoned legislative veterans. The series will run every Sunday morning, bright and early.
Last week, the New Faces in Congress series continued with a profile on Rep. Val Hoyle from Oregon’s 4th district. If you missed it, feel free to click on this link to read all about her!
Next week, I will profile Rep. Jeff Jackson of North Carolina’s 14th district. See you then!
Rep. Wiley Nickel (North Carolina-13)
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