Three candidates for Democratic nominee for North Carolina District 14 of the House of Representatives clashed in a student-moderated forum on Tuesday. Seeking the nomination were attorney and political organizer Brent Caldwell, business consultant Lakesha Womack and former IT professional and 25-year-old political newcomer Ahmid Kargbo.  

Voters will head to the polls Tuesday, Mar. 3 to determine which candidate is best suited to represent the district—and unseat current Rep. Tim Moore, a Republican, who won the seat by 16 points in 2024. Moderator and Davidson Democrats Co-President Julia Siqueira’s (’26) first main question was “What puts you in the best position to beat Tim Moore?”

Each candidate took a different approach.

Womack pointed to the community connections she is making on the campaign trail.

“Looking at the district and knowing that it was gerrymandered […] how do you represent a district that is so diverse, from rural counties to suburban areas to urban areas? I really started thinking about what unites us from all the areas that I visited,” Womack said. “For me, it’s about going out into the community, talking to people, and helping people to see that we have more in common than we think.”

Caldwell emphasized the infrastructure and competency of his campaign rather than particular policy concepts.

“I’ve worked on three congressional races and I was a labor organizer. I have a strong sense of how to run a successful campaign and how to organize on the ground. Having good ideas is not going to win this election. You’re going to have to have resources and infrastructure in place to get that message out,” Caldwell said, pointing to endorsements from the AFL-CIO and the Charlotte Observer. “I’ve raised $70,000, which isn’t a tremendous amount for a congressional campaign, but is many times over what my opponents have raised.”

In contrast, Kargbo placed specific legislative proposals at the center of his pitch.

“Voters are desperately wanting for someone who is desperately going to fight for them with policies that are economically possible like Medicare For All, universal health care, and abolishing ICE,” Kargbo said. “We have to run on a big plan, introducing things like high speed rail, connecting our infrastructure with rural areas, and nationalizing Duke Energy.”

Separately, in court documents obtained by The Davidsonian, Kargbo was found guilty in 2023 on charges of reckless driving: wanton disregard for human life after a speeding incident. After his license was suspended, Kargbo continued to drive and was charged with driving without a license after being pulled over for an expired and rain-damaged temporary license plate later that year. 

“I’ve learned my lesson here, the law is the law, but I’m not too remorseful about it,” Kargbo said in an interview with The Davidsonian. “I wasn’t about to kill anybody. I wasn’t hurting anybody.”

Kargbo emphasized his commitment to safe driving in the years after completing his license suspension period in 2024.

“I’ve followed the rules ever since. I haven’t gotten a ticket since,” Kargbo said. “Most people won’t look at it as that big of a deal, especially if I keep a clean record for a few years.”

Kargbo also used the story in multiple ways to highlight issues of justice. 

“The fastest people on the road are literally police officers. The people who enforce the law do not follow the rules a lot,” Kargbo said. “The highway I was driving on destroyed historically black neighborhoods so people in the white suburbs can commute to Charlotte.” 

While the three candidates refrained from direct shots at one another, Caldwell made reference to a snub from Kate Barr, a self-avowed progressive challenging Moore for the Republican nomination to protest North Carolina’s extreme gerrymandering.

“I reached out last week to Kate Barr to see if she would sign onto a joint statement calling for the resignation of [Commerce Secretary] Howard Lutnick for lying about his relationship to [Jeffrey] Epstein. I was going to get Kate on board and then come to my other opponents so we could say that every person in this race besides Tim Moore, who surely would not go against President Trump, is trying to hold the Epstein class accountable,” Caldwell said. “Kate Barr declined to do that, so that did not get out of the gate.” 

During an event at Davidson later in the week, Barr justified her refusal to sign Caldwell’s proposition under the principle that her campaign makes its own statements rather than sign onto those of other candidates.

“I’m happy to sign anything that I have written shaming anyone who has protected pedophiles, whether that’s in the Epstein files or otherwise,” Barr said. “But I write my own words, and I don’t sign other people’s.”

Caldwell, Womack and Kargbo also pitched signature policy proposals. 

Womack promoted preventing corporations from receiving tax breaks if they neglect to pay their workers a living wage. Caldwell endorsed campaign finance reform mandating that donors to a campaign be located in the jurisdiction where the candidate is running. Besides the many policy proposals he pointed to in his initial pitch, Kargbo also mentioned his desire to deal blows to the military industrial complex. 

Both Caldwell and Kargbo committed to refusing to take donations from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), a pro-Israel lobbying group that has attracted criticism for its support for increased aid to Israel amid the country’s military actions in Gaza.

The forum was made largely possible by Davidson Democrats Community Engagement Chair Dylan Swick ‘28 who navigated competing campaign schedules to find a time that worked for all three to visit.

“After building rapport through continued interactions with the three, I was able to successfully pitch the idea of the panel,” Swick said. “It was incredibly difficult to get all three in the same room at the same time, but after a lot of communication I was able to find one day that worked.”

At the forum the candidates projected an air of unity around both their distaste for Moore’s representation of their district and a modicum of faith in one another as potential stewards of the Democratic nomination. 

“I hope you all feel that no matter which one of us is elected, you feel that you have a representative that you can reach out to that you can share your concerns with,” Womack said.