NC House Republicans failed in 2021, they failed in 2023, and they’ve seemingly failed in 2025.
North Carolina House Republicans’ Failure to Deliver Constitutional Carry
Despite holding a legislative majority and an effective supermajority the North Carolina House Republicans have repeatedly failed to pass constitutional carry legislation. Over multiple sessions, bills such as HB 197 (2021–2022), HB 189 (2023–2024), and SB 50 (2025–2026) have either stalled, been vetoed, or failed to overcome opposition, even when Republicans had the political leverage to enact them. The failure was not due to Democrats obstructing from a position of power, but rather because Republican leadership could not unite their own caucus or prioritize the bill when it mattered.
During the 2023–2024 term, the GOP controlled both chambers and had the numbers to override vetoes, which they did for several controversial bills. However, when it came to HB 189, the House failed to even bring the bill to a floor vote after it passed committee. The official excuse was timing and legislative overload, but the real reason was political caution. Republican leadership appeared unwilling to force the issue, despite overwhelming grassroots support for permitless carry. This pattern repeated in 2025, when SB 50 was vetoed by Governor Stein. Although the Senate overrode the veto, the House fell just short—not due to Democratic obstruction, but because two Republican members voted against the bill and leadership failed to whip the votes.
This failure to pass constitutional carry has real political consequences. As the Libertarian candidate for House District 32 in 2024, I ran a visible and principled campaign heavily focused on Constitutional Carry, which likely cost Republicans a competitive seat. I took heat from Republican activists and party operatives who claimed I was undermining “gun rights.” This was the term they were going to pass Constitutional Carry except I ruined it. Yet when SB 50 came up in 2025, it wasn’t a Libertarian who killed the bill. It was the two Republican House members. Even if Republicans had flipped my race, they still would not have had the votes to override Stein’s veto unless they could manage their own caucus. The failure wasn’t mine; it was theirs.
The inability of Republican leadership to secure two or more votes in their own caucus is telling. In a legislature that successfully pushed through veto overrides on a range of social and education policy along with another gun bill, it is striking that constitutional carry, which is supposedly a top GOP priority, was left hanging. This suggests that the support for gun rights within the caucus is either weaker than advertised, or that leadership lacked the will to spend political capital to see it through. Either way, the result is the same: despite repeated opportunities, constitutional carry failed not because of divided government, but because of internal Republican divisions and lack of coordination.
In conclusion, the Republican-controlled North Carolina House has had multiple chances to deliver constitutional carry and failed each time. These failures have occurred even during periods of GOP supermajority, and even while Republicans succeeded in overriding vetoes on other issues. The cause is not third-party candidates, nor Democratic obstruction—but the House Republicans’ inability to marshal their own votes and follow through on their stated priorities. If constitutional carry is a Republican value, then their repeated failure to pass it raises serious questions about whether they actually intend to see it enacted.
As the House Speaker, Destin Hall, said during the veto override day, July 29th, "If you want to come down here and debate, go run for public office." That is what I am encouraging you all to do now. Because the House won’t even hold a roll call vote on the override, we can’t know who really believes in Constitutional Carry.
There were 59 House members on the record supporting gun rights this term, as far as I’m concerned, the others are fair game.
https://ncleg.gov/Legislation/Votes/RollCallVoteTranscript/2025/H/426
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