The last line of defence for abortion rights in the South – and Biden’s best ally

Every time the US vice president Kamala Harris visits North Carolina, the state’s governor Roy Cooper reminds her how many times she has visited the Tar Heel state.

“She’s been a dozen times since she's been vice president to North Carolina,” Mr Cooper told The Independent. The two have known each other for more than a decade since Ms Harris was attorney general for California and he served in the same job for North Carolina.

Ms Harris has traversed the state, travelling to Raleigh, but also to NC A&T, one of the state’s historically Black colleges and universities, to talk about voting rights. While many worry about Ms Harris given polls her low approval rating, Mr Cooper said she is a major asset as she and President Joe Biden seek to flip North Carolina.

“She can obviously relate to women and what they are going through,” he said. “And plus she has been on the front lines of protecting women’s healthcare, both as attorney general, as a United States senator and now as vice president.”

Mr Cooper, who will leave office at the end of this year, is becoming an increasingly rare figure: he’s a white male Democrat from the South in a state that Donald Trump won. Nonetheless, he hopes to help Mr Biden and Ms Harris flip a state that has remained just outside of Democrats’ grasp.

“There’s no question that the road to the White House will go through North Carolina,” he said, pointing to the fact that the state provided his closest win and he won it by a smaller margin than he did in 2016. Mr Cooper would know: both times he ran for governor in 2016 and 2020, Mr Trump was at the top of the ballot.

Mr Cooper has largely won in the state on a platform of competence. He received high marks for helping North Carolina through