• Press Release

EMILYs List President Calls On Judge Griffin To Give Up Efforts to Overturn His Loss in North Carolina Supreme Court Race

January 23, 2025

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Yesterday, the North Carolina Supreme Court issued a decision to dismiss Jefferson Griffin’s request for a writ of prohibition and send his challenges to throw out the votes of more than 65,000 eligible North Carolina voters back to superior court. Justice Riggs’ election victory has been certified by two separate recounts but her opponent Judge Griffin is still refusing to concede. EMILYs List President Jessica Mackler released a statement in response: 

“Judge Griffin must concede this election and give up his baseless, anti-democratic attempt to throw out more than 65,000 legal votes. Justice Allison Riggs has won the election and North Carolina voters deserve finality instead of a drawn-out and ultimately futile legal challenge. State Supreme Courts play a vital role to protect democracy and our fundamental rights and Judge Griffin’s attempt to overturn this election is a disgrace to the very seat he attempted to fill.”

Justice Allison Riggs currently serves on the North Carolina state Supreme Court. She was appointed by Gov. Roy Cooper in 2023. She attended college, graduate school, and law school at the University of Florida. Following her time in Florida, she spent 14 years as a civil rights and voting rights attorney at the Southern Coalition for Social Justice in Durham, North Carolina, subsequently she became the co-executive director for programs and chief counsel for voting rights. Riggs has spent her entire career fighting for equal justice under the law for every North Carolinian.​ She has argued before the U.S. Supreme Court twice in landmark redistricting cases. Prior to her appointment to the North Carolina Supreme Court, she was appointed to the Court of Appeals. Riggs is the youngest woman to ever serve on the North Carolina state Supreme Court. EMILYs List was proud to endorse Riggs in her campaign.

EMILYs List, the nation’s largest resource for women in politics, works to elect Democratic pro-choice women up and down the ballot and across the country with a goal of fighting for our rights and our communities. Over nearly 40 years, EMILYs List has raised nearly $950 million to help Democratic women win competitive elections by recruiting and training candidates, supporting and helping build strong campaigns, researching the issues that impact women and families, running one of the most impactful independent expenditure operations for Democrats, and turning out women voters to the polls. Since our founding in 1985, we have helped elect the country’s first woman as vice president, 192 women to the House, 29 to the Senate, 20 governors, and over 1,600 women to state and local office. More than 40% of the candidates EMILYs List has helped elect to Congress have been women of color. Visit www.emilyslist.org for more information.