Dan Bishop
James Daniel Bishop is an American attorney and politician who has been serving as the interim United States attorney for the Middle District of North Carolina since November 12, 2025. A member of the Republican Party, he previously served as the Deputy Director of the Office of Management and Budget in 2025, as a U.S. representative from North Carolina from 2019 to 2025, as a North Carolina state senator from 2017 to 2019, as a member of the North Carolina House of Representatives from 2015 to 2017, and as a member of the Mecklenburg County Commission from 2005 to 2009.
Bishop was the lead author of North Carolina's Public Facilities Privacy & Security Act, commonly called the bathroom bill, which prohibited transgender people from using public restrooms other than those of their biological sex as defined on their birth certificates. As a result of backlash, North Carolina lost a significant amount of revenue from companies and other organizations who chose to withdraw their investments in the state.
On September 10, 2019, Bishop won the special election to the U.S. House of Representatives with 50.7% of the vote to Dan McCready's 48.7%. Bishop ran for re-election in 2022 in North Carolina's 8th congressional district, following the 2020 census and subsequent litigation contesting the maps drawn by the General Assembly. In the 2022 U.S. congressional election, Bishop won reelection to his seat with 69.9% of the vote. In 2024, Bishop retired from Congress to run unsuccessfully for attorney general, losing to Democrat Jeff Jackson.
On December 10, 2024, President-elect Donald Trump announced his intention to nominate Bishop as the deputy director of the Office of Management and Budget. He was confirmed by the Senate on March 26, 2025. He served in that position for nearly eight months until President Donald Trump appointed Bishop to become the interim United States attorney for the Middle District of North Carolina.
Education
Bishop received a B.S. in business administration from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1986 and a J.D. from the University of North Carolina School of Law in 1990.County Commission and North Carolina House of Representatives (2005–2016)
Bishop was a member of the Mecklenburg County Commission from 2004 to 2008. After a six-year absence from politics, he was elected to the North Carolina House of Representatives from a south Charlotte seat for a single term, running against a Libertarian opponent, Eric Cable, but without a Democratic one. Bishop's district was House District 104. He succeeded Ruth Samuelson, who retired from the House.North Carolina State Senate
Bishop won his North Carolina State Senate District 39 seat in November 2016 to succeed Bob Rucho, who was not seeking reelection. He received 58,739 votes, defeating Democrat Lloyd Scher, who received 44,655.During the 2017–18 legislative session, Bishop co-chaired the Select Committee on Judicial Reform and Redistricting, was vice-chair of the Select Committee on Elections, and a member of several other committees.
Bishop has attracted attention for statements attacking journalists, which have been likened to statements by Donald Trump. On one occasion, he criticized the Raleigh press corps over coverage of the state budget, calling them the "jihad media."
Bathroom bill and backlash
Bishop was the architect of the Public Facilities Privacy & Security Act, or House Bill2. This controversial "bathroom bill" restricted transgender people from using gender-segregated public facilities other than those identified for use by their biological sex as defined on their birth certificates. The bill, signed into law by Governor Pat McCrory, also invalidated a local nondiscrimination law passed by the Charlotte City Council and prohibited any local government in North Carolina from enacting new protections for gay, lesbian, or transgender people. Bishop used his sponsorship of HB2 in fundraising emails, stating that he stood up to the "radical transgender agenda". His role in promoting HB2 raised his profile.In 2017, after a public backlash against the legislation and economic harms of $3.7 billion, HB2 was repealed and replaced with new compromise legislation brokered between Governor Roy Cooper and the leadership of the state legislature. Bishop was the sole senator to make a floor speech against HB2's revocation, calling it a "betrayal of principle". In emails from Bishop subsequently made public under North Carolina's public-records law, Bishop compared LGBT rights activists to the Taliban.
After the release of a video showing a group of people following McCrory, shouting "shame" and calling him a bigot, Bishop said he would introduce legislation "to make it a crime to threaten, intimidate, or retaliate against a present or former North Carolina official in the course of, or on account of, the performance of his or her duties."
U.S. House of Representatives
Elections
2019 special election
On March 14, 2019, Bishop entered the 9th congressional district special election. He won the May 14 Republican primary with 47% of the vote. The election had been called after the results of the regular election were thrown out due to irregularities with absentee ballots in the district's eastern portion. The Republican nominee in that contest, Mark Harris, had defeated Democrat Dan McCready by 905 votes, the closest race in the district in decades. Much of the district's share of Mecklenburg County had not been represented by a Democrat since 1953, and the 9th has been in Republican hands without interruption since it was configured as a Charlotte-based district in 1963.In the September 10 general election, Bishop defeated McCready, 50.7% to 48.7%. He won mainly by dominating the more rural areas of the district, as well as Union County, the district's largest whole county. The closeness of the race was remarkable given the 9th's heavy Republican bent on paper; it had a Cook Partisan Voting Index of R+8.
2020 election
2022 election
Tenure
Bishop took office on September 17, 2019.Bishop, along with all other Senate and House Republicans, voted against the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021.
2020 presidential election
On January 6, 2021, Bishop was one of 147 Republican lawmakers who objected to the certification of electoral votes from the 2020 presidential election after a mob of Trump supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol and forced an emergency recess of Congress. Later that month, he voted against a failed attempt to impeach Trump for his alleged role in inciting the mob to storm the Capitol.Iraq
In June 2021, Bishop was one of 49 House Republicans to vote to repeal the AUMF against Iraq.Israel
Bishop voted to provide Israel with support following 2023 Hamas attack on Israel.Defense
In July 2022, Bishop was the only House Republican to vote for an amendment that would have cut the proposed defense budget by $100 billion. On the same day, Bishop was one of 14 Republicans to vote for a separate amendment that would have removed a proposed $37 billion spending increase in the defense budget.Committee assignments
- Committee on Homeland Security
- * Subcommittee on Counterterrorism, Law Enforcement, and Intelligence
- * Subcommittee on Oversight, Investigations, and Accountability
- Committee on the Judiciary
- * Subcommittee on the Administrative State, Regulatory Reform, and Antitrust
- * Subcommittee on the Constitution and Limited Government
- Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government
Caucus memberships
- Freedom Caucus
- Republican Study Committee
- Border Security Caucus
- Congressional FFA Caucus
- Congressional Prayer Caucus
- Election Integrity Caucus
- Values Action Team
Financial contributions to the social network Gab