0 until it wasn t. all of those measures to improve voter participation in north carolina were signed into law by democratic governors. but in 2010, republicans had a plan to turn all that around. in the 2010 midterm elections, the elections that took place two years into president obama s first term, republicans basically ran the table, right? they painted the country red. and the opposition party, the party that s not in the white house always does well in the midterms. that s always the case. but in 2010, the opposition did spectacularly. republicans took back control of the house of representatives in washington. they picked up an astonishing 63 seats in the house. republicans that year also picked up six seats in the united states senate. whether republicans really cleaned up in 2010 was in the states. that year republicans won 680 seats in state legislatures across the country, took control of more legislative seats in the states than at any point since 1928. that happened that y
0 it was the largest increase in turnout anywhere in the country between the 04 election and 08 election was in north carolina, and it was not just a flash in the pan for that one election. north carolina had been on its way up for years at that point. it had been on its way up from the very, very bottom. back in the early 1990s, north carolina was at the very bottom. the state ranked 47th in voter participation. 47th out of 50. the state started making an effort to turn that around and by the 2000 presidential election, north carolina had risen from 47th in the nation to 34th in the nation in terms of turnout. and by 2008, they d gone from 34th in the nation up to 2 1st in the nation. then in the last election by 2012, north carolina had risen all the way up to 11th in the country in terms of voter turnout. from 47th to 11th. north carolina cracked the code. millions of dollars directed by this one guy. and it worked. of the 22 legislative races that were targeted by art pope that y
0 world. there s long form harder work that has to be done to addresses issues. vince warren, executive director of the center for constitutional rights. david sirota at salon.com. msnbc contributor james peterson. thank you very much. that all in for this evening. the rachel maddow show starts live from north carolina, the frontline in the voting rights battle. good evening, rachel. good evening, chris. it s a beautiful night here. thank you, my friend. i appreciate it. thanks to you at home for staying with us the next hour. we re bringing you this show this hour from not our usual home base with way more mosquitos than are usually ever on my face. here s why we re on the road. the day before the 08 presidential election, the morning of the day before the election, presidential candidate barack obama that day got a phone call in the morning telling him that his grandmother had just died. she had died at the apartment in hawaii where he had lived with her for a time when he w