You Think That Rearranging Furniture at the SBOE Absolves It of Corruption? Dallas Woodhouse Still Works There!

 

NC Voices

 

The cover story Dave Boliek put out in September 2025 about hiring Dallas Woodhouse as some sort of State Board of Elections (SBOE) "liaison," whose role, we would soon discover -- to absolutely no one's surprise -- was actually to lord it over county boards of elections and inhibit college-age and Black voters wherever possible. At the time of Woodhouse's hiring, Boliek announced him to county election officials: "[I hired] him to assist in your efforts to ensure election integrity while encouraging maximum participation in our elections." Hahahahaha

The best reporting I've seen on the Woodhouse "reassignment" at the SBOE, the piece below, is thorough and complete. I don't know who wrote it, but thank you!

And if you're a partisan like me and tempted to celebrate the mere rearrangement of furniture at the SBOE -- window-dressing for a corrupt and exposed operation -- I would advise you not to. Dallas Woodhouse is still there at the SBOE, along with his embedded philosophy of might-makes-right, and trailing all that heavy baggage of cut-throat politics. You think the people who hired Woodhouse and who now obviously depend on him to be there have changed their spots? This isn't a victory, but it exposed their corruption. 

RALEIGH -- By WRAL News  A North Carolina Republican operative who was hired by the state auditor to help shape the state’s election boards and early voting plans has been reassigned, and his election liaison position has been discontinued. 

State and county elections officials are beginning to ramp up preparations for the 2026 midterm elections. Mail-in ballots will go out in September, early voting starts in October and election day is Nov. 3.

State Auditor Dave Boliek reassigned Dallas Woodhouse, a former executive director of the North Carolina Republican Party, NBC News reported Wednesday morning. Woodhouse had served in the role since September.

“Now that we are more than a year past appointments, and board chairs have settled into their roles having worked through a municipal election, primary election, and most of the local boards have passed early voting plans for the general election, the Auditor's Office has discontinued the elections liaison role,” a spokesman for the auditor’s office told WRAL in a statement Wednesday. “The elections liaison was established because the Auditor's Office gained new responsibilities. The position was not meant to be permanent.”

Woodhouse will work on strategic initiatives that relate to constituent services and communications, according to the spokesman.

Republican state lawmakers stripped responsibility for overseeing state and county election boards away from Democratic Gov. Josh Stein in 2024 and gave the power to Boliek, a Republican. Under Boliek and Woodhouse, the state board of elections and all 100 county election boards have switched to GOP majorities, and some have begun enacting longtime Republican priorities such as eliminating early voting options on Sundays — a popular day with Black voters and on college campuses. Black voters and students tend to vote Democratic.

According to reporting from WLOS and NC Local, Woodhouse and Boliek were involved in efforts to ensure the new Jackson County Board of Elections would shut down a polling place on campus at Western Carolina University. In the Triangle, the Wake County Board of Elections also recently voted to eliminate a longtime early voting site at N.C. State’s student union, and to move it to a remote part of campus, WRAL previously reported.

Woodhouse was reassigned on June 2, NBC News reported. Woodhouse earns $110,000, according to a database of state employee salaries.

In September, Boliek wrote to some county election officials that “to assist in your efforts to ensure election integrity while encouraging maximum participation in our elections, I have appointed Dallas Woodhouse as my liaison.”

Woodhouse referred a request for comment Wednesday to the auditor’s office.