Tim Moore, R-Cleveland; Leo Daughtry, R-Johnston; Justin Burr, R-Stanly; John Blust, R-Guilford; Mitchell Setzer R-Catawba; and Bryan Holloway, R-Stokes, have expressed interest for the nomination.
The N.C. Republican House Caucus will decide on its nominee for speaker on Nov. 22. The caucus heard from the candidates at a closed-door meeting Saturday, according to the Winston-Salem Journal.
The full House will vote on the next speaker on Jan. 14, the opening day of the 2015 session, said Norma Houston, a lecturer in the UNC School of Government. Republicans have a majority in the chamber with 74 of the 120 votes.
Gary Pearce, a liberal political analyst, said in an email that the speakership will be especially important in 2015 because state lawmakers will be thinking about the 2016 election.
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“(The) Senate may continue to push hard to the right ideologically and the House could determine the state’s direction depending on how adroit or not its leaders are,” he said.
Thomas Mills, a Democratic consultant, said Moore and Daughtry are the current frontrunners.
“Tim Moore has been leadership material for a while,” he said. “He’s smart and young and has lots of terms.”
Becki Gray, vice president for outreach at the conservative John Locke Foundation, said the candidates are diverse in terms of age and time served, as well as where they come from in the state.
Daughtry has the most legislative experience, with 13 terms in the legislature, including two in the Senate and 11 in the House. Burr has served the fewest total terms, with three in the House.
“The interest is not just isolated to the House of Representatives,” Gray said. “It’s not just an election of the House since the Speaker of the House also works with members of the Senate and governor.”
She said caucus meetings are a good opportunity for candidates to make their case to new N.C. General Assembly members, since there are a large number of freshman legislators.
Whether the Democrats will hold a caucus is unclear, but Houston said though Democrats are in the minority, their votes could be important if Republicans split the vote because of too many candidates.
Both parties usually have caucuses before Thanksgiving and typically plan to rally support behind one candidate each for opening day, Gray said.
Houston said members of the caucuses can pledge support for a specific candidate, but are not mandated to vote for that person on opening day.
“No one is bound to their vote,” she said.
But the speaker is the most powerful member of the House, she said, and voting differently than one pledged can be detrimental to that House member.
Tillis helped lead the passage of several key pieces of legislation during his tenure as speaker, including an average 7 percent pay hike for the state’s public school teachers that he touted often throughout his campaign for Senate.
