Roy Asberry Cooper III was born on June 13,1957 and is an American attorney and politician, serving as the 75th governor of North Carolina since 2017.
45 Facts About Roy Cooper
2.
Roy Cooper was reelected in 2020, defeating Republican nominee and Lieutenant Governor Dan Forest.
3.
Roy Cooper's mother was a teacher and his father a lawyer.
4.
Roy Cooper attended public school and worked on his parents' tobacco farm during summer.
5.
Roy Cooper graduated from Northern Nash High School in 1975.
6.
Roy Cooper received the Morehead Scholarship at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill for his undergraduate studies.
7.
Roy Cooper was elected president of the university's Young Democrats.
8.
Roy Cooper earned a Juris Doctor degree from the University of North Carolina School of Law in 1982.
9.
Roy Cooper was elected to the North Carolina House of Representatives in 1986, defeating longtime incumbent Allen Barbee in the Democratic primary.
10.
Roy Cooper drew little attention to himself during his first term aside from resolving a school merger dispute in Nash County.
11.
Roy Cooper continued to practice law while serving in the legislature.
12.
In 1989, Cooper joined Republicans and dissident Democrats to unseat Speaker Liston B Ramsey.
13.
Roy Cooper was appointed to the North Carolina Senate in 1991 to serve the remainder of a term of a senator whose seat had become vacated upon his death.
14.
Roy Cooper then negotiated a compromise bill to schedule a referendum to amend the constitution and grant the governor veto power.
15.
In 1997, Roy Cooper was elected majority leader of the State Senate.
16.
Roy Cooper was elected North Carolina attorney general in November 2000, defeating Republican lawyer Dan Boyce and Reform Party candidate Margaret Palms.
17.
Roy Cooper took office on January 6,2001; he was reelected in 2004.
18.
Roy Cooper was mentioned as a possible Democratic candidate for governor in 2008, but decided to run for reelection as attorney general instead.
19.
Roy Cooper was easily reelected, defeating Republican Bob Crumley and garnering more votes than any other statewide candidate in the 2008 attorney general election.
20.
In 2012, politicians suggested him as a possible candidate for governor of North Carolina after incumbent Governor Bev Perdue announced her retirement, but Roy Cooper declined to run.
21.
Roy Cooper was unopposed in both the Democratic primary and the general election.
22.
In January 2007, when Durham District Attorney Mike Nifong asked to be recused from dealing with the Duke lacrosse case, Roy Cooper's office assumed responsibility for the case.
23.
In 2011 Cooper argued his first case before the United States Supreme Court, JD B v North Carolina, a case related to Miranda rights in juvenile cases.
24.
Roy Cooper ran for governor of North Carolina in the 2016 election against incumbent Republican Pat McCrory.
25.
Roy Cooper denounced the law as unconstitutional and refused to defend it in court in his capacity as attorney general.
26.
When initial election results showed Roy Cooper leading, McCrory claimed without evidence that the election had been manipulated by voter fraud.
27.
Out of 4.7 million total ballots, Roy Cooper won by 10,227 votes.
28.
On December 5,2019, Roy Cooper announced his candidacy for reelection.
29.
Roy Cooper was sworn in as governor on January 1,2017, in a small ceremony.
30.
Roy Cooper's planned public inauguration was canceled due to a snowstorm.
31.
Roy Cooper signed two bills to allow domestic violence protective orders granted by a judge to fully go into effect even when they are under appeal and to expand the state's "revenge porn" law from cases involving former lovers to those involving strangers.
32.
On July 26,2017, Roy Cooper signed a bill to mount cameras on school buses in order to reduce drivers who illegally pass stopped school buses.
33.
On March 6,2019, Roy Cooper proposed a $25.2 billion budget for the year.
34.
Roy Cooper said that he was confident he could get the legislature, without enough Republican members to override a veto, to implement some of his ideas.
35.
On March 10,2020, Roy Cooper declared a state of emergency in North Carolina due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
36.
Roy Cooper vetoed a bill on April 21,2017, to reduce the size of the North Carolina Court of Appeals by three judges.
37.
Roy Cooper vetoed a bill on April 21,2017, that would create a new State Board of Elections split evenly between the Republicans and the Democrats.
38.
Roy Cooper vetoed a bill that would limit individuals' ability to sue hog farms.
39.
In July 2017, Roy Cooper vetoed a bill to authorize nonprofit organizations to operate "game nights", saying it would unintentionally create a new opportunity for the video poker industry.
40.
Roy Cooper vetoed the bill due to a provision that made campaign finance investigations less public, but the General Assembly overrode his veto.
41.
In total, during his first two years in office, Roy Cooper vetoed 28 bills, 23 of which were overridden by the legislature.
42.
In May 2019, Roy Cooper vetoed a bill that proposed punishments in the form of prison time and fines against physicians and nurses who do not resuscitate newborns that survive an abortion.
43.
Roy Cooper said that the "bill is an unnecessary interference between doctors and their patients" and that laws "already protect newborn babies".
44.
Roy Cooper is married to Kristin Cooper, who worked as a guardian ad litem for foster children in Wake County.
45.
Roy Cooper has taught Sunday school classes, serving as a deacon and elder at White Memorial Presbyterian Church, and is an avid fan of the NHL's Carolina Hurricanes.