Voters in North Carolina’s House District 35 will be seeing familiar names on the ballot as incumbent Republican Mike Schietzelt faces off in a rematch against Democrat Evonne Hopkins. Schietzelt and Hopkins, both lawyers, ran against each other in the 2024 general election, with Schietzelt winning the seat by about 1,820 votes out of the nearly 57,000 cast.
Schietzelt, a married father of four, previously served in the U.S. Marine Corps as part of the Marine Drum and Bugle Corps and currently works as an attorney at a local law firm. This past legislative session was Schietzelt’s first time holding public office, and the lawyer spent his first term siding with his Republican colleagues to help utility companies charge more, gerrymander congressional districts, and put more power into the Republican-led General Assembly.
This election season, opponents of the lawmaker have taken aim at not just his legislative record, but at his commentary and involvement in controversial events at the federal level.
Prior to being a lawmaker, Schietzelt had a legal career, serving as a law clerk to former North Carolina Supreme Court Chief Justice Mark Martin. The New York Times reported that Martin played a major role in Donald Trump’s unconstitutional attempted power grab after the 2020 election. The News & Observer reported that Martin “helped write lawsuits to overturn Biden’s election in key states and that it was Martin who incorrectly told the president that Vice President Mike Pence had the “ability to throw out any election results he viewed as fraudulent.”
Following the 2020 election results, when Trump was insisting he had won the election and spread harmful election fraud claims, Schietzelt took to social media to defend Trump’s comments.
According to Cardinal & Pine, Schietzelt promoted “stolen election” lies under the X (formerly Twitter) handle @mike_schietzelt as Donald Trump attempted to overturn his election loss.
In one post, he invokes the idea that the state legislatures could award their electoral votes to Trump, adding, “A state can take back its power to choose electors at any point. Popular vote means nothing.”
In another post, Schietzelt expressed support for the Texas lawsuit in a post on Dec. 10 and referred to the election as “stolen”, Cardinal & Pine reports.
“There is something rotten in the United States,” Schietzelt wrote. “I’m willing to lose honorably, but there is no honor in conceding a stolen election. I fully support the #TexasLawSuit and *fighting* honorably.”
Additionally, Schietzelt took to social media to speak positively about the overturning of Roe v. Wade. He took pride in the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade because he helped draft and submit an amicus brief in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health to the Supreme Court, the ruling that overturned Roe. This is another marker of his legal career; one that was once mentioned on his campaign website but has since disappeared.
This November voters in North Wake will remember his track record, both as a lawyer and a legislator, as they seek to find someone to represent them in the state legislature.
Schietzelt is one of two Republicans serving Wake County out of the 19 State House and Senate seats in the county.
Schietzelt faces off against Democrat opponent Evonne Hopkins, a married mother of two and a small business owner with a successful family law practice. She owns and operates the Raleigh Law Center in North Raleigh and is a North Carolina Board Certified Family Law Specialist and Certified Parent Coordinator.
