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Opinion: Would Roy Cooper vex Senate Democrats like John Fet....John Fetterman votes with Democrats over 90% of the time.That hasn’t stopped him from becoming a fixation of the party base.He’s been criticized for straying rhetorically, for occasionally voting with Republicans and for failing to reflect the urgency many in the base feel — even to the point of being recruited by Trump.That his deviations have been largely symbolic, rarely changing outcomes, hasn’t mattered much.The energy spent policing Fetterman is real.But so is its cost.Because, while Democrats attempt to unseat a senator already in their coalition, they are also trying to flip numerous Republican seats in states much more red than Pennsylvania.Which raises a question the party has avoided answering directly: what kind of Democrat are they actually willing to tolerate?Democrats currently hold 47 Senate seats.To reach a majority, they need to win in places like North Carolina, Ohio, Alaska and Maine — while holding everything else they have.That map requires candidates who will, at times, sound different, vote differently and prioritize political survival over purity.Of all these states, North Carolina may be Democrats’ best pickup opportunity.Roy Cooper’s record of a long tenure in public office and a reputation as a fighter makes him a strong candidate on paper.But if he wins, he will present the party with the same problem Fetterman has, only more acutely: a Democrat representing a non-safe-seat who cannot afford to behave like a safe-seat progressive.The Fetterman debate offers a preview of what Cooper could encounter.Deviate from the party line and the response will not be to weigh the deviation against the broader record, or the popularity of the policy in the state they were elected, but to treat it as disqualifying.The implicit standard becomes total alignment, even where that alignment is politically unsustainable.So it’s worth asking now, before Cooper ever casts a Senate vote: if agreeing with the party most of the time isn’t enough for a state that went for Trump by less than three points, how much will be enough in a state Trump carried three times by an even larger margin?The answer, if Cooper’s career is any guide, will not be 100%.And that’s where the tension begins.Cooper is frequently described as a moderate when he is more accurately a fighter.As governor, he vetoed 104 bills (nearly three times the combined total of every other North Carolina governor since the veto was created).He blocked abortion restrictions, bans on gender-affirming care, expansions of gun access and efforts to force cooperation with ICE.He responded aggressively to COVID-19, closing schools, issuing stay-at-home orders and mandating masks while Republicans accused him of abusing emergency powers.These are not the actions of a moderate by any stretch of the word.But Cooper also has a long record of working across the aisle — because he had to.And the constituencies he would need to win a Senate race — rural, business-friendly moderates, disaffected Republicans, ticket-splitters — do not reward rigid ideological consistency, particularly relative to the national platform.Cooper is also, in some ways, peculiar in that he was the product of a small, rural town who navigated progressive politics with a Southern schtick.That combination has become almost extinct at the national level of progressivism: it’s not easily replicated, and it may explain why he’s been so successful.We know Cooper can win in North Carolina.The question now is whether the Democratic base can tolerate the deviations necessary for him to stay there and be effective.Cooper’s campaign so far has been deliberately modest: make stuff cost less, fight the chaos in Washington.A politician who knows which battles to pick.Getting elected will be the first of many.Because when the votes come — on immigration, on policing, on spending, on issues that don’t fit neatly into campaign slogans — Democrats will face the same choice they’ve been rehearsing with Fetterman.They can treat his deviations as betrayal, or they can treat it as the cost of building a large majority big enough to counter Donald Trump.Because if Cooper wins, progressive disappointment is inevitable.There are positions in his record that have not yet been fully pressure-tested by a national progressive base or by Republican opponents.When they are, the reaction will not be theoretical.Democrats need to decide, in advance, whether they’re prepared to live with the kind of senator he could be, given the real ideological and electoral constraints of a red-leaning state.Or they will expect him to behave like a Californian or a New Yorker, lending credence to Michael Whateley’s attack line that Cooper’s moderation is a façade.And Democrats will have handed Republicans the argument before Cooper ever takes the oath.Jordan Meadows is a North Carolina native working as a staff writer for The Carolinian newspaper and author of the blog Preserving Progress, preservingprogress.com.This popup displays a promotional message.