Allison Riggs didn't set out to be at the center of the nation's sole uncalled 2024 election, but it's fitting that she is. Before Riggs became a justice on the North Carolina Supreme Court, she spent years as an attorney pushing to make it easier for people to vote, often challenging Republican-passed laws. Now she's at the center of one of the most pitched battles over vote-counting in memory. In November, Riggs, a Democrat, appeared to win reelection to the court by a paper-thin 734-vote margin, but her opponent, Republican Jefferson Griffin, has challenged more than 60,000 votes'effectively trying to get courts to change the rules of the election, despite the votes already having been cast and counted. Whether those votes are included in the final tally will decide the outcome of the race'and Riggs's political future. 'I didn't expect for me to be in a the-cheese-stands-alone kind of situation,' she told me in late March at her home in North Carolina. 'I don't want this fight,...
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