North Carolina's 1st congressional district

North Carolina's 1st congressional district
Interactive map of district boundaries since January 3, 2025
Representative
Population (2023)754,008
Median household
income
$55,409
Ethnicity
Cook PVIR+1

North Carolina's 1st congressional district is located in the northeastern part of the state. It consists of many Black Belt counties that border Virginia and it extends southward into several counties of the Inner Banks and the Research Triangle. It covers many rural areas of northeastern North Carolina, among the state's most economically poor, as well as outer exurbs of urbanized Research Triangle. Some of larger towns and cities in the district include Elizabeth City, Goldsboro, Henderson, Rocky Mount, Roanoke Rapids, and Wilson.

The first district is currently represented by Don Davis.

On February 5, 2016, the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled the 1st district, as well as the 12th, were gerrymandered along racial lines, which was unconstitutional, and must be redrawn by March 15, 2016. It was re-drawn again in 2019 following court-mandated redistricting, which removed portions of the Research Triangle from the district and changed it to D+3 from a D+17 on the Cook Partisan Voting Index.

Besides a brief period from 1895 until 1899 when the district was held by a Populist, the 1st district has been consistently Democratic since 1883.

On February 23, 2022, the North Carolina Supreme Court had approved a new map that was only used for the 2022 United States House of Representatives elections which changed the 1st district boundaries to add Chowan, Currituck, Franklin, Greene, Pasquotank, Perquimans counties and the remainder of Vance County while removing Wayne County.

On October 25, 2023, the North Carolina General Assembly approved a new congressional map shifting the district's Cook Partisan Voting Index from D+2 to R+1. It is the most competitive district in North Carolina.

The district was one of 13 congressional districts that voted for Donald Trump in the 2024 presidential election while simultaneously electing a Democrat in the 2024 House of Representatives elections.