10 things about Asheville, North Carolina native Madison Cawthorn

David Madison Cawthorn is a native of Asheville, Buncombe County, North Carolina, United States. The city was named after Samuel Ashe, who served as the ninth governor of the state from 1795 to 1798.

BIOGRAPHY

Cawthorn is an American politician who describes himself as a constitutional conservative born in Asheville to Roger Cawthorn and Priscilla Cawthorn. Madison’s younger brother Zachary Cawthorn is a professional financial adviser.

On August 1, 2025, Madison turned 30. Here are 10 more things about him:

1. He was home schooled in Hendersonville, North Carolina.
2. He received a full ride Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC) scholarship to North Carolina State University in Raleigh, North Carolina.
3. In 2014, Mark Meadows nominated him to the U.S. Naval Academy but his plans derailed after he nearly died that year in a tragic automobile accident that left him partially paralyzed and in a wheelchair, according to his website.
4. In 2016, he entered Patrick Henry College in Purcellville, Virginia, USA and started dating Hailey Roberts.
5. He is the sole owner and employee of the investment firm called SPQR LLC and reported no income from it on the financial disclosure form he filed in 2020.
6. In 2020, he married Cristina Bayardelle.
7. In 2021, he and Bayardelle separated.
8. From 2021 to 2022, he was a member of the U.S. House of Representatives from North Carolina’s 11th district.
9. In 2024, he was involved in a crash along Alligator Alley in Collier County, Florida, USA.
10. In 2025, he was arrested in Cape Coral, Florida.

TIMELINE

Madison is a Republican. When he was 25 years old, he was elected as a Republican to the 107th Congress, making him the youngest member of U.S. Congress in modern history.

2010s

• On April 3, 2014, he was a passenger in a sport utility vehicle, a 2007 BMW X3, on Interstate 4 near Daytona Beach, Florida when his friend Bradley Ledford fell asleep at the wheel and the vehicle crashed into a concrete barrier. They were returning home to North Carolina from a spring break vacation in Florida. After a personal injury lawsuit, he settled his claim with Ledford. He was assigned the right to sue Ledford’s insurance carrier Auto-Owners Insurance Company for failing to initiate timely settlement negotiations with him.
• In August 2016, he entered Patrick Henry College where he studied political science. His average grade in most classes was a D.
• In October 2016, he started dating Roberts.
• He and Roberts were supposed to get married on December 16, 2017 but the wedding did not happen because while they were engaged, she ran off with his best friend Luke Shanahan. The heartbreak caused him to withdraw from Patrick Henry College.
• On October 12, 2017,  when Auto-Owners Insurance Company’s lawyer Greg Burge asked him if the U.S. Naval Academy notified him that he did not get in before the accident on April 3, 2014, he said yes.
• In August 2019, he created SPQR LLC.

2020s

• After Joe Biden defeated Donald Trump in the 2020 U.S. presidential election in November 2020, he was one of the politicians who claimed that the election results were fraudulent.
• In December 2020, he and Bayardelle got married in a civil ceremony.
• On December 21, 2020, he delivered a speech to the conservative group Turning Point USA. He said, “Get on the phone. Call your congressman. You can lightly threaten them and say, ‘If you don’t start supporting election integrity, I’m coming after you, Madison Cawthorn’s coming after you, everybody’s coming after you.'”
• On January 3, 2021, he was sworn in as North Carolina’s 11th District representative.
• On the morning of January 6, 2021, he spoke before Trump’s supporters who attended the rally near the White House in Washington, D.C., USA. He said, “The Democrats, with all the fraud they have done in this election, the Republicans hiding and not fighting, they are trying to silence your voice.” At around 1:00 p.m., Trump’s supporters breached the U.S. Capitol building  in Washington, D.C. while a joint session of Congress was certifying the vote of the Electoral College and affirming Biden’s victory in the 2020 presidential election. At around 3:00 p.m., he called into the radio show “The Charlie Kirk Show” to do an interview. He told the host Charlie Kirk that he carried loaded weapons into the White House that day. He said, “Me being in a wheelchair, I am able to carry multiple weapons at one time.”
• On January 8, 2021, he wrote on Twitter, “Last night, I spoke out in defense of our Constitution and a fair electoral process. I also unequivocally denounced the violence that took place in our nation’s capitol, it wasn’t patriotism it was thuggery. We are all Americans. What unites us is greater than what divides us.”
• In an interview with Pamela Brown of CNN on January 23, 2021, he said, “Yes, I think I would say that the election was not fraudulent. You know, the Constitution allowed for us to be able to push back as much as we could and I did that to the amount of the constitutional limits that I had at my disposal so now I would say that Joseph R. Biden is our president.”
• On January 24, 2021, his office stated that he “stands firm in his belief that objecting to the certification of electoral college votes was an important step in safeguarding a free and fair electoral process” although it is “difficult to quantify the number of fraudulent ballots cast in any election.”
• In April 2021, he and Bayardelle had an outdoor wedding ceremony.
• On May 4, 2022, a video of him naked in bed, thrusting his genitals toward another man’s face while moaning, went viral. That day, he took to Twitter to confirm the legitimacy of the video, stating, “Years ago, in this video, I was being crass with a friend, trying to be funny. We were acting foolish, and joking.”
• On January 3, 2023, his term as a North Carolina congressman ended.
• On April 15, 2024, while driving his black Mercedes, he allegedly tailgated Alethea Shapiro then plowed into a Florida Highway Patrol‘s car, which was parked at a construction zone on I-75 eastbound in Collier County. He caused an estimated $30,000 worth of damage but received only a $133 ticket for it.
• On August 19, 2025, he was cited for driving without a valid license in Naples, Florida.
• On September 10, 2025, a warrant was issued for his arrest after he failed to show up to the arraignment scheduled for 8:30 a.m. that day. Later that day, he was arrested at his residence in Cape Coral and released on a $2,000 bond.
• On October 1, 2025, he announced his plan to run for Florida’s 19th congressional seat.