North Carolina House candidate sues political group over ads linking him to illegal gambling site

Charles Taylor, a Republican candidate for the North Carolina House of Representatives, has filed a defamation lawsuit against a political group over campaign ads that connected him to an allegedly illegal gambling operation. The defendant is the Sandhills Citizens Alliance (SCA). Taylor sits on the Sanford City Council and is running in House District 51.

The complaint was filed on October 27 in Lee County Superior Court. It targets mailers and website content that, according to Taylor, falsely said he ran a casino near a local middle school and was under investigation by state ethics officials. He says the material misrepresented two news reports the group cited, which described him as the owner of the property rather than the operator of the gambling business.

Taylor acknowledges owning the building where the gambling activity takes place, but says his role is only that of landlord and that he has no ownership interest in the tenant's business. According to the complaint, he bought the property for $60,000 in December 2025 and was told a tenant was already in place. He kept the existing lease but did not take over the business or its equipment.

The suit also disputes the ethics claim. A private citizen filed a complaint on October 9 about his financial disclosure statement, but Taylor said that as of October 15 the State Ethics Commission had not opened a formal investigation. His lawyers argue the ads wrongly link him to criminal activity, damaged his reputation and forced him to spend campaign time on his defense. He seeks at least $25,000 in compensatory damages along with punitive damages. His legal team sent a cease-and-desist letter on October 21, and the group reportedly missed the October 23 deadline to retract.

SCA has denied the allegations and called the lawsuit an attempt to distract from questions about Taylor's candidacy. It says its materials relied on earlier published reporting and that political speech about candidates is constitutionally protected.

The dispute follows an October 13 investigation by The Assembly that tied the building to a game room reportedly holding 22 slot machines. Commercial slot-machine gambling is illegal in North Carolina, where legal casino gambling is limited to the state's three tribal casinos. Taylor won the March GOP primary and faces Independent April Montgomery in the election on November 3, 2026.