Senate President Pro Tempore Phil Berger is down by 23 votes to Rockingham Sheriff Sam Page. It’s not the end of the story.
Elections aren’t over until the last vote is counted — and even then, maybe not.
That may be the case in the close contest between Senate President Pro Tempore Phil Berger, R-Rockingham, and Rockingham Sheriff Sam Page for the State Senate District 26 seat, encompassing Rockingham County and portions of Guilford County.
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On election night, the competitors were separated by two votes, with Page leading. Since, county election officials have counted military and overseas ballots, other absentee ballots received on Election Day and provisional ballots deemed acceptable. Now, Page is 23 votes ahead.
Guilford County Election Director Charlie Collicutt and Rockingham County Election Director Paula Seamster say they don’t expect any more ballots to come in at this point. Right now, they are double-checking their work and taking care of any administrative challenges, like cases where a voter died between casting a ballot and Election Day.
On Friday, March 13, both county elections boards will conduct their canvass meetings, where they will approve the official election results.
Berger, who has led the Republican caucus in the Senate for 16 years, is unlikely to give up the fight that easily.
Road to a recount in Page vs. Berger
While neither Page nor Berger have declared an intent to call for a recount if they place second, everyone is expecting it.
“I'm just trying to follow the process, but at this point, we don’t anticipate falling behind,” Page said.
When asked whether he would call for a recount if he placed second, Page said he would “cross that road when we get there.”
Berger did not respond to a request for comment.
The margins will likely be small enough to justify a recount. Under North Carolina law, losing candidates in state legislative races may request a recount if the difference in votes between them and the winning candidate is less than 1% of the total votes cast in the race.
In this case, 23 votes is well below that 1% threshold in the 26,249-vote race. If the results remain as they are, Berger can request a recount after the county canvass. He would have until noon on March 17, the second business day after the canvass, to do so.
If a recount occurs, the State Board of Elections will oversee the process and make the rules, but county election officials would conduct recounts in their respective counties.
The State Board has a few choices. They can call for a full machine recount, where the vote is retabulated by voting machines used in the district. Or they can call for a hand-to-eye recount in a sample of precincts in each county.
They will also guide county boards on how to determine voters’ choices in grey areas — as in, whether a ballot should count if a machine does not catch a voter’s choice, but there is a checkmark beside a candidate’s name — and ensure order.
If the recount is not hand-to-eye, and it doesn’t change the results, the losing candidate can request a second recount that is hand-to-eye within 24 hours. If the machine recount reverses the results, the original election winner has that same right.
Hand-to-eye recounts involve counting all the ballots cast in 3% of precincts in each county by hand. The recounts are bipartisan processes, with various participants and observers from both parties involved.
If the hand-to-eye recount results, when extrapolated to the entire district, would change the election outcome, then the State Board must order a full hand-to-eye recount of all precincts and all ballots.
Page said he was concerned about State Auditor Dave Boliek’s potential oversight of any recount. Boliek, who has oversight over certain aspects of elections after SB382’s passage, also campaigned for and endorsed Berger.
Page said Boliek is “linked” to Berger, and he can’t separate that from his oversight of elections.
“When you do that, you come to my county and you’re campaigning for my opponent, I think you cross the line, and I think that's a conflict,” Page said. “And the best thing to do is just recuse yourself. It takes away any air of impropriety, and lets the public know that you're doing what's right.”
Protesting an election
It may not end there. Candidates can also file election protests to challenge the results.
There are two categories of election protests. The first involves issues with vote counting or results tabulation. If a candidate claims that some misconduct occurred in this area that could have changed the election result, they can file a protest about it before the county canvass. (Sometimes, they will be accepted up to two days after the canvass, but only with good reason.)
Neither Collicutt nor Seamster has received such a protest.
The other category involves all other election misconduct or irregularities. Candidates must file those protests within two business days of canvass completion, likely March 17.
Berger could file an election protest over the counting of provisional ballots, for example, if he disagreed with the county’s choice to count or not count certain votes.
Voters use provisional ballots when questions arise about their eligibility to vote, they can’t show acceptable photo ID or they are at the wrong polling place.
If such questions come up, election officials have until the end of business on the Friday after Election Day to research voters and determine whether they are eligible. Voters have until that same Friday at noon to present acceptable voter ID, if that is the issue. If voters are at the wrong polling place, their vote will count for the contests that are actually in their precinct, and will be discarded for other contests.
Election officials previously had until the day before canvass to research and resolve these issues, but their deadlines tightened after the passage of Senate Bill 382 in late 2024.
Originally, Rockingham County had 137 provisional ballots and Guilford County had 52 in Senate District 26. However, not all of them involved voters who used the Republican primary ballot, which caused the number of provisional ballots to decline, Collicutt said.
In all, 95 were counted in the race: 59 for Page and 36 for Berger.
Seamster said the majority of provisional ballots dealt with voters on the Registration Repair Project list, which arose from the last major election protest after the 2024 election.
The list includes voters who lack a driver’s license number, the last four digits of their Social Security number or an affirmation that they possess neither, on their voter registration record. Since July 2025, State Board of Elections Executive Director Sam Hayes has worked to gather that information. Voters who are on the list must vote provisionally, and complete their voter record.
Seamster said all voters who used provisional ballots because they were on the list ultimately had their votes counted.
If there is a protest, it will start at the county board. They will determine whether it was filed correctly and whether there is reason to believe an election violation might have occurred. If not, they will dismiss the protest.
If the protest passes the first stage, the county board will conduct a hearing on the issue. Board members will decide whether substantial evidence of an election law violation exists, and if so, whether it was enough to potentially alter the election results. If both are true, then the board can order a recount, correct the vote total or send their decision to the State Board for further action, like calling for a new election.
In a multi-county race like this, county boards may send the protest to the State Board earlier, to avoid coming to different conclusions in different counties.
The State Board will make a final decision.
Going beyond the State Board
Candidates have one last remedy, if the State Board’s decision is not in their favor.
They can appeal the State Board’s protest decision to the courts — specifically, the Wake County Superior Court. From there, the protest might make its way up and down North Carolina’s court system, as Jefferson Griffin’s Supreme Court election protest did last year before he conceded.
When all is said and done, the State Board will certify the election. If there are no complications, it will happen six days after the county canvass. If a protest is made, however, certification will wait until after the protest comes to a final resolution.
In short, this primary election could be far from over.
This article first appeared on Carolina Public Press and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.