The congressman from the 1st District is G.K. (George Kenneth) Butterfield, a Democrat who won a special election in July 2004. Butterfield grew up in Wilson County, where his father was a dentist and the first black elected official in Wilson in the 20th century. His mother was a schoolteacher for 48 years. He got his bachelor’s degree and a law degree from North Carolina Central University. A civil-rights lawyer who represented poor people, Butterfield took on many voting rights cases. As a Superior Court judge for 12 years, he handled thousands of civil and criminal cases in 46 counties until February 2001, when Democratic Gov. Michael Easley appointed him to the state Supreme Court. After Butterfield lost election in 2002 to a full term, Easley appointed him as a special Superior Court judge. In the July 2004 special election to replace the retiring Democratic Rep. Frank Ballance, who later pleaded guilty to federal fraud charges in the operation of his antidrug foundation, party caucuses selected the nominees, and the six-week contest in this safe Democratic district received little local or national attention. Butterfield said that his priorities would be strengthening the rural economy and halting U.S. job losses. He won 71%-27% and has not been seriously challenged since. Read More

The congressman from the 1st District is G.K. (George Kenneth) Butterfield, a Democrat who won a special election in July 2004. Butterfield grew up in Wilson County, where his father was a dentist and the first black elected official in Wilson in the 20th century. His mother was a schoolteacher for 48 years. He got his bachelor’s degree and a law degree from North Carolina Central University. A civil-rights lawyer who represented poor people, Butterfield took on many voting rights cases. As a Superior Court judge for 12 years, he handled thousands of civil and criminal cases in 46 counties until February 2001, when Democratic Gov. Michael Easley appointed him to the state Supreme Court. After Butterfield lost election in 2002 to a full term, Easley appointed him as a special Superior Court judge. In the July 2004 special election to replace the retiring Democratic Rep. Frank Ballance, who later pleaded guilty to federal fraud charges in the operation of his antidrug foundation, party caucuses selected the nominees, and the six-week contest in this safe Democratic district received little local or national attention. Butterfield said that his priorities would be strengthening the rural economy and halting U.S. job losses. He won 71%-27% and has not been seriously challenged since.

In the House, Butterfield rarely makes headlines but is considered an important behind-the-scenes strategist for both the Democratic leadership and the Congressional Black Caucus. He has a liberal voting record, particularly on economic matters. One of his issues was settling claims of up to 74,000 African-American farmers who were unfairly discriminated against when applying for Agriculture Department loans and programs between 1983 and 2010. “It brings an end to an unfortunate chapter in our history,” he said after the House approved the measure in December 2010. That same month, he and Brad Miller were the only House Democrats from North Carolina to oppose extending the Bush-era tax cuts for high-income earners. He lobbied to include an exhibit in the new Capitol Visitor Center on the slave labor that was employed in building the Capitol and on the careers of the 22 African-Americans who served in Congress during and after Reconstruction. He also pushed for renewal of the Voting Rights Act, noting that his father lost his seat on the local city council in 1957 because of a discriminatory voting law change.

A longtime friend of Democratic Rep. James Clyburn of South Carolina, Butterfield managed his successful campaign for majority whip in 2006. Butterfield subsequently became a chief deputy whip under Clyburn and kept the position in 2011 when Democrats reorganized after losing majority control of the House. In 2009, Butterfield also became secretary of the Black Caucus, an influential faction in the House, and moved up to second vice chair two years later. He has been less confrontational toward Obama than other CBC members, and, along with Clyburn, was one of six in the group who supported the president’s 2010 bill to fund the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

With his connections to the leadership, Butterfield got a seat in 2007 on the influential Energy and Commerce Committee, where he has worked to prohibit states from passing on their Medicaid costs to counties. In his district, many counties spend more of their property-tax revenues on Medicaid than on public schools. In 2009, he persuaded then-Chairman Henry Waxman, D-Calif., to ensure that more of the revenue from the Democrats’ proposed cap-and-trade system of carbon emissions swapping would be used to help low-income areas. However, the bill stalled in the Senate. In early 2011, Butterfield became the ranking Democrat on the Commerce, Manufacturing and Trade Subcommittee. He joined Waxman in pushing back against GOP claims that the Consumer Product Safety Commission was harming manufacturers, citing surveys showing strong public support for the agency.

The independent Office of Congressional Ethics investigated Butterfield and five other House members after The Wall Street Journal reported in March 2010 that the members did not return unused portions of their travel allowances. But the House Ethics Committee in January 2011 declined to take any action against the members.