Are marketing campaign funds allowed to cowl Raleigh journey and meals?

While campaign funds are often used for the traditional expenses one might expect — such as advertisements or events — many of North Carolina’s state lawmakers have found other uses for the money.

Analysis from The News & Observer of campaign finance reports for top North Carolina legislative leaders from both parties in 2025 and early 2026 found campaign donors’ money being used to pay rent, fund out-of-state travel and foot the bill at high-priced steakhouses.

None of these usages are necessarily illegal — but they could overlap with public funding that also pays lawmakers’ expenses, something which the state’s Board of Elections has said should be avoided to prevent “personal enrichment.”

In a state with one of the lowest salaries for lawmakers, they have an extra incentive to find creative uses for campaign funds.

“The lines are blurry, and we’re paying these folks $13,951 a year,” Chris Cooper, a political scientist at Western Carolina University, said. “I mean, the surprise would be, in some ways, if they didn’t engage in this kind of behavior.”

At less than $14,000 a year, North Carolina lawmakers earn a base salary well below the national average — which is just under $48,000.

They also receive a year-round monthly expense allowance of at least $559 and, while in session, a $104 daily allowance for meals and lodging, along with one weekly travel reimbursement payment based on the roundtrip distance between their home and Raleigh. Lawmakers can also receive additional pay for travel and lodging between sessions when representing the legislature.

Lawmakers in leadership positions are also paid significantly more than their counterparts, with the speaker of the House and the Senate president pro tempore each earning a yearly salary of roughly $38,000 with a monthly expense allowance of $1,400.

What did top NC lawmakers use campaign funds for?

A number of legislative leaders used campaign contributions to pay for travel, meals or rent. The N&O reached out April 9 to lawmakers referenced in this article.

Several members of Republican leadership in the House and Senate reported using campaign funds to pay for rent at residential properties this year and last.

The State Board of Elections prohibits candidates from using campaign funds to pay for property they or their family own.

That rule, however, doesn’t address property owned by businesses — like apartment complexes — that candidates might use campaign funds to rent from.

In general, state law requires that campaign funds be used only for expenditures related directly to campaigning or the official duties of holding public office. Candidates may also donate their campaign funds to nonprofits, political parties or other candidates.

In 2025, Senate leader Phil Berger reported spending $4,500 in rent at an apartment complex in Reidsville in his home county of Rockingham. In the first three months of 2026, he spent $3,280 on the apartment.

A spokesperson for Berger said the apartment was for his campaign manager during the March primary election.

House Speaker Destin Hall, who lives in Caldwell County, reported spending nearly $11,000 on rent at a downtown Raleigh apartment complex in 2025. His colleague in the House, Majority Leader Brenden Jones, reported spending about $14,000 in rent at the same complex. Both reported continuing to use campaign money for rental payments into 2026.

Neither of the top Democratic leaders in the House and Senate reported spending campaign funds on rent over the last two years.

It’s also somewhat common to see lawmakers use campaign funds to pay for office space. Berger, for example, reported spending $24,000 last year on rent for an office in his district.

Some candidates also report spending heavily on travel, including to out-of-state locations. State law does not specifically address travel expenses, whether in-state or out-of-state.

House Democratic Leader Robert Reives spent around $14,000 on various travel expenses in 2025, including a trip to Mississippi, which he said was to attend the National Black Caucus of State Legislators.

“I travel often due to various leadership positions I serve in because of my role as House Democratic Leader,” Reives said. “… I also travel around North Carolina and the nation to help fundraise for our caucus.”

And in the Senate, Democratic leader Sydney Batch spent about $5,700 on travel-related expenses like airfare, hotels, parking and conference fees, including a legislative summit in Boston hosted by the National Conference of State Legislatures.

Hall spent about $6,000 in total on gas, hotels and airfare last year, including a trip to Charleston. And Berger spent roughly $6,800 on similar travel-related expenses, including stays in Washington.

In many cases, the finance reports are vague as to where exactly the travel occurred, so it is not possible to definitively state what portion of their expenditures came from out-of-state travel.

Other expenditures are more niche. Like House Speaker Pro Tempore Mitchell Setzer, who spent nearly $6,700 on what appear to be commemorative coins from a company based in Utah. The report lists the costs, which came from two payments in January and March 2025, as being for “NC House Pro Tempore Coins” and provides no further details.

Candidates also use campaign funds for meals, sometimes on days when the legislature is in session and they are already receiving a per diem.

Last year, Jones, the majority leader, reported spending roughly $3,700 on what he described as “legislative meals.” Most of these were in downtown Raleigh, near the Legislative Building. They included two trips to Sullivan’s, an upscale steakhouse on Glenwood Avenue.

Public funding and private gain

State law doesn’t directly address meals, but the state’s board of elections issued a declaratory ruling in 2024 that said lawmakers can use campaign money to cover lodging, meals and travel while doing their job — but only if they haven’t already been fully reimbursed by the state or another source “since that would result in personal enrichment.”

The state constitution prohibits private gain from public funds.

Bob Hall, a long-time campaign watchdog, said he didn’t think the board’s ruling is “widely appreciated” by lawmakers.

“It’s understandable that they occasionally use campaign money to serve in office,” but “the overarching issues are public funds being used for personal profit and whether there’s a structural problem with lawmakers not being provided a living wage,” Hall said.

Hall has filed numerous complaints across the years accusing lawmakers of using public funds for private gain. He filed a complaint against Berger in 2019, accusing him of using campaign donors’ money to buy a Raleigh home. The board of elections adopted a rule in 2020 barring this practice. The state’s legislative ethics committee also issued guidance aimed at preventing lawmakers from collecting per diem while simultaneously using campaign funds — but later repealed that guidance after the Board of Elections’ rule change.

For Hall, lawmakers’ salaries and per diem payments need to be increased, because if campaign funds must be used “to overcome the lack of proper compensation, then only the ones that are rich in campaign funds can take advantage.”

The Senate’s Democratic whip, Sen. Jay Chaudhuri from Wake County, echoed Hall, saying in an email that “when public service is only financially viable for those with independent wealth or flexible employers, it narrows the pool of people who can run and serve in office.”

“I’ve long believed the General Assembly should reflect the people of North Carolina – that’s why I’ve sponsored bipartisan legislation to establish session limits, which would make service more compatible with working people’s lives. I also believe in reforming legislative pay that could include establishing a travel budget for conferences,” he said.

Chaudhuri reported $315 in meal expenses and just over $570 in travel, along with just over $3,000 paid to a legislative assistant in 2025, according to campaign finance filings.

Chaudhuri said his campaign pending is disclosed to and routinely audited by the elections board and the travel covered political and policy events in Cherokee, Charlotte, Washington, D.C., and Boston, and that the meal was a working gathering for staff. He said that payments to legislative staff for campaign-related work are a “common arrangement” and permitted practice under General Assembly policies.

What they make from the state

A database obtained by The N&O through a public records request shows that, aside from their salaries and monthly expense allowances, lawmakers who served the full year in 2025 all received about $13,800 in recurring payments for their daily in-session work. The rest of what they were paid varied, mainly based on how much they traveled and other non-recurring reimbursements they claimed.

Apart from the salary and expense allowance, Berger, who lives in Eden, was paid $37,270; Hall, who lives in Granite Falls, was paid $23,068; Batch, who lives in Apex, was paid $17,256; and Reives, who lives in Goldston, was paid $20,676.

Berger, on Jan. 23, 2025, was paid $8,528 via a non-recurring reimbursement — the highest single-day reimbursement in the database. The same day, his campaign finance reports show an expense of $595 for lodging and parking from a December trip.

On that payment, a spokesperson for Berger said the “reimbursement stemmed from an administrative issue that resulted in Sen. Berger’s per diem not being disbursed on a regular basis.”

The database provided to The N&O does not include details on what the non-recurring payments were for. It also only lists the payment date and not the date of the expense. The N&O requested reimbursement forms that would show those details for 2025 in late February but has not received them yet.

Lawmakers must submit those forms for any payments for travel between sessions as a representative of the legislature, and also must get approval from the House speaker or Senate leader.

Lawmakers can also be reimbursed for registration fees. State law does not specify what type of registration fees that encompasses.

For Hall, if lawmakers were paid more by the General Assembly, then there would need to be more oversight.

An “enforceable” rule barring the simultaneous use of state funds and campaign money for the same expenses would be “valuable,” he said.

When the Board of Elections sees charges for something like gas, “there’s not really a way to know whether that’s above and beyond what the legislator could have justifiably charged their campaign.”

This story was initially revealed April 15, 2026 at 5:00 AM.