Former Durham City Council member DeDreana Freeman has filed to run for state senate, initiating a Democratic primary showdown with first-term incumbent Sophia Chitlik in the district that covers much of Durham County.
Freeman filed on Wednesday, according to county records; she has not yet sent out a press release and was not immediately available for comment. Asked about the challenge, Chitlik told the INDY she’s “look[ing] forward to a positive campaign.”
Many voters may know Freeman better than they know the incumbent. Freeman spent eight years on the Durham council before losing her seat in a close race last month. Chitlik has held office since January, after defeating longtime state senator Mike Woodard last year.
Chitlik’s playbook for unseating Woodard involved highlighting areas where she came out a purer progressive; she criticized him for voting with Republicans too often, including voting to override Governor Roy Cooper’s veto several times, and sought to position herself as the more pro-choice candidate even as he voted with Democrats on abortion policy. She touted her work as an investor in maternal healthcare—including helping launch the state’s first Black-owned birthing center—and her experience as a mother.
Chitlik will not be able to distinguish herself in that way from Freeman, a Black mother of three who built a reputation on the Durham council as a far-left progressive likely to side with the protest going on outside city hall—rallying with city sanitation workers for higher wages, pushing for the Gaza ceasefire resolution to include the word “genocide,” and often falling in the minority voting bloc that pushed back on development proposals.
Nor will Chitlik necessarily have an incumbent advantage regarding experience. She came into office with a little over a year of combined experience working as an Obama campaign organizer and in the Obama administration’s labor department. Freeman served on the planning commission for three years before her eight on council.
But Freeman has been on shaky ground with some Durham voters of late. Voters rejected not just her recent council re-election bid but her mayoral run in 2023, in which she finished third with just 14 percent of the vote. To beat Chitlik, Freeman will need to gain back some voters who have turned away from her. She’ll also need to overcome fundraising challenges. Her opponent in the recent council race, Matt Kopac, significantly out-raised her—and Chitlik has historically been a strong fundraiser, having raised substantial sums from both in-state and out-of-state donors in her successful challenge to Woodard.
Chitlik moved to Durham in 2018. Her professional background includes founding several organizations, including a “wellness company that supports people through the transformational journey of pregnancy and birth” and a “boutique international consulting firm committed to building up believers across the globe,” per her LinkedIn. In the state senate, Chitlik’s efforts have centered on expanding Medicaid coverage for reproductive care and childcare.
Freeman has lived in Durham since the mid-2000s, when she received a Master of Public Administration degree from North Carolina Central University. She spent nearly a decade working in various capacities at the East Durham Children’s Initiative and before that served as a transit education specialist at Clean Energy Durham. She also served as president of the InterNeighborhood Council. As an elected official and community organizer, Freeman has prioritized economic equity and housing justice.
North Carolina Senate District 22 has a solidly blue voter base, so the Democratic primary on March 3 will effectively decide the race.
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Correction: A previous version of this story incorrectly stated Woodard broke with Democrats on abortion policy.