Scotland and Hoke Counties are among the most medically underserved counties in the state. As a rural physician, Dr. Carter is uniquely qualified to advocate for patients of District 48. He has seen firsthand that healthcare has become increasingly difficult to access, too expensive, and often more about profit than patient wellbeing, while rural counties are expected to accept even lower quality services. Dr. Carter will advocate for rural patients, oppose diversion of health care resources and to call out money making schemes in the medical industry and insist on reform. 

 Dr Carter will work to reform medical care in North Carolina by: 

• Advocating for price transparency requirements so patients know costs upfront and reduce prescription drug costs. 
• Outlawing financial incentives for practitioners to give any pharmaceuticals. 
• Prohibiting corporate funding by vested interests of medical research and treatment protocols. 
• Fighting against any measures to bring less qualified doctors to NC, especially to only rural areas. 
• Identifying Medicare and Medicaid fraud and abuse to ensure funding goes to our most vulnerable. 
• Requiring insurance companies to cover integrative, holistic, and functional medicine. 
• Working to educate more medical professionals in District 48 by establishing a rural medical academic center right here. 
• Protect the liberty of individuals by freeing them from all medical mandates. 
• Insisting on rigorous language competency standards for immigrant doctors. 
• Removing the tyrannical emergency laws that allowed the ineffective and destructive Covid lockdowns, which closed churches and schools, but left bars and liquor stores open, and devastated our state’s economy. 
• Re-establish the God ordained rights of parents to make health care decisions for their children. 
• Partner with churches to initiate the Faith in Mental Health initiative in District 48 to support people in need of mental health services. 
• Embrace and facilitate the national effort to make our citizens, and especially our children, healthy again. 
• Opposing diversion of health care resources desperately needed in our rural district to politically powerful and affluent health care corporations in urban areas.

Regulations designed to line the pockets of corporations and special interests lead to high prices and corrupt practices. From the politics of energy to overtaxation. THIS IS CORRECT) of farmers, there are many ways North Carolina can insist on higher quality food at a more affordable price. 

Dr. Carter will advocate for more abundant, healthier food by: 

• Advocating for food-producing local farms to be passed down to family members without taxation to allow generational farming. 
• Preventing banks from discriminating against farmers for not complying with political environmental practices and ensuring equal access to financing. 
• Working to provide higher quality, healthier, locally sourced foods to school children while eliminating ultra-processed foods from school menus. 
• Reclaiming North Carolina farmland from foreign countries to protect our food production and our national security. 
• Opposing any attempt to relieve farm chemical companies from liability for the harm their products cause. 
• Supporting federal and state funding of our farmers to help them make a common-sense shift to more regenerative farming practices.

Hoke and Scotland Counties are facing a water crisis. Much of Hoke County, and Scotland County towns like Wagram and Gibson need more water. Hoke County is currently purchasing water from Fayetteville, but there is a proposal, from influential upstream power brokers with lobbying clout, to restrict the flow of that Cape Fear River water. It’s cheaper for wealthier communities like Fuquay-Varina near Raleigh to support their massive overdevelopment by cutting back our water supply, inhibiting our growth, and forcing water resource development costs downstream to our less affluent counties. Dr. Carter will not sit back and allow it. He has already testified in Raleigh against the upstream diversion of our water supply, fighting to let the water—rather than additional costs—flow our way.” 

As your next House Representative for District 48, Dr. Carter will be on the front lines to ensure that the overdevelopment by real estate tycoons erecting luxury developments near Raleigh does not use their influence and power to restrict our much-needed water supply. This isn’t just an issue of drinking water, but firefighting and economic development.

Every child, regardless of the wealth of their community, is entitled to a quality education. Hoke County public schools get the lowest county funding for education with one of the highest poverty rates. In Hoke County, over 71% of students are economically disadvantaged.  

We need an advocate in Raleigh for teachers and students, a Representative who will insist on cutting bureaucratic bloat and putting more money directly into the classroom. Dr. Ralph Carter will work to ensure teachers are paid fairly, and their classrooms are fully funded; no teacher should feel compelled to spend their personal money on school supplies. 

Dr. Ralph Carter will advocate to strengthen education by: 

• Expanding the Small County School System Supplemental Plan so Hoke County can receive funding as Scotland does.    
• Providing supplements for poor student populations. 
• Require school districts receiving state funding to freeze growth of administrative positions until classrooms are fully funded, including the purchase of adequate classroom supplies. 
• Taking politics, including distortions of our nation’s history, out of the classroom. 
• Increasing teacher pay and working to attract high-quality teachers. 
• Requiring a teacher’s aid in each classroom and capping classroom sizes. 
• Supporting school choice so parents can select the best educational option for their children. 
• Encouraging parent-teacher partnerships and local control.

Dr. Ralph Carter will advocate for state funds to build wider and safer roads, water and sewer systems, and government buildings, including schools. This would include a comprehensive regional water resource plan to address emergency water shortage in Hoke, and also the water needs for outlying areas of Scotland county, coordinating with the Lumber River water project. This critical issue has not been effectively addressed by the current leadership.  

District 48 deserves a vocal advocate to bring more state dollars home to improve the safety of our roads and economic development, which requires strong infrastructure. He would push for an interstate caliber highway paralleling US 401, the backbone highway of the Laurinburg – Raeford – Rockfish 48th district. It would serve as an I-95 to I-74 connector and would stimulate development throughout our district. This would logically connect to the delayed I-74 bypass of Laurel Hill, just west of Laurinburg, providing a needed access from I-95 to Charlotte.

The number one job of the government is to keep its citizens safe, but Hoke has above-average rates of violence, and Scotland is among North Carolina’s most dangerous counties. Dr. Carter will fight for appropriations to fund more law enforcement officers and modern technology. He will support tough-on-crime legislation, including stiffer penalties for the distribution of deadly fentanyl. 

We also must support our law enforcement and first responders with ample, up to date tools. And while we can never pay those risking their lives every day enough, Dr. Carter will support higher pay and better benefits for first responders.