Democrat Roy Cooper and Republican Michael Whatley easily won their primaries for North Carolina’s U.S. Senate race Tuesday. But the results show that Democrats appear more motivated to vote in 2026 than Republicans.
Cooper faced no serious challengers in his primary race.
However, more than 800,000 people voted anyway in the Democratic U.S. Senate primary on Tuesday. That’s an increase of more than 30% compared to 2022, when Cheri Beasley won the Democratic Senate primary, also with little competition, after Jeff Jackson had dropped out of the race earlier.
On the Republican side, only about 626,000 people voted in the GOP primary this year. That’s an 18% drop from the number of voters who cast ballots when Ted Budd won the Republican primary four years ago over Pat McCrory.
That enthusiasm gap in the primaries four years ago held through the general election, when Budd defeated Beasley in November.
This year, Democrats and some unaffiliated voters are angry about President Trump and they seem eager to show that anger at the ballot box.
Overall turnout in the 2026 primary was just under 20% of registered voters. That’s about the same as in 2022.
Mecklenburg County’s turnout was 15.5%. The state’s second largest county often lags in getting people to vote.
