Former North Carolina governor Roy Cooper has opened his widest lead yet over Republican Michael Whatley in the race for the state’s open US Senate seat, according to a WRAL/WSOC poll conducted by SurveyUSA between October 7 and 11 that put the Democrat ahead 54% to 40%, with 5% undecided, among 900 North Carolinians surveyed.
Multiple Polls, One Direction
The SurveyUSA numbers aren’t an outlier. A separate ECU poll conducted September 30 to October 3 among more than 800 respondents had Cooper ahead 50% to 43%, and an Elon University poll put the race at 53% to 42%. Pollsters note the surveys use different methodologies and turnout models, which explains the gap between a 7-point and a 14-point Cooper lead, but all three point the same direction in a state Donald Trump carried twice and where Republicans had hoped an open seat would be a pickup opportunity.
Two Well-Known Names, One Open Seat
The seat opened up after Senator Thom Tillis announced he would not seek a third term, setting up a race between two candidates with unusually high name recognition for a midterm cycle. Cooper left the governor’s mansion in January 2025 after eight years in office and remains one of the most popular Democrats to have held statewide office in North Carolina, while Whatley spent two years running the Republican National Committee before stepping down to enter the race with Trump’s early backing.
Why the National Parties Are Watching Closely
North Carolina is one of roughly ten races CNN’s political team named on October 22 among the Senate seats most likely to flip this cycle, as Democrats need to net four seats nationally to retake the majority. Decision Desk HQ’s forecasting model currently gives Democrats a 54% chance of winning Senate control overall, a shift from earlier in the cycle when analysts rated the chamber a near-certain Republican hold.
Republicans Argue the Polls Undercount Their Base
Whatley’s campaign and national Republicans have pushed back on the poll numbers, arguing that live-caller and online surveys have consistently undercounted Trump-aligned voters in North Carolina in past cycles, and that early and mail turnout data undercounts the rural and exurban base they’re counting on to show up on Election Day itself. Whatley has leaned into that argument on the trail, telling supporters the race will tighten once voters who don’t answer pollsters’ phones start casting ballots.
What’s Next
With roughly two weeks until Election Day, the race is expected to draw tens of millions of dollars in outside spending from both parties’ Senate campaign arms before polls close. Early voting data released by the state board of elections will be the next concrete signal either side can point to, and both campaigns have scheduled closing-argument rallies in the Raleigh-Durham media market in the race’s final week.
A Race Both Parties Expected to Be Closer
Strategists in both parties privately admit the contest hasn’t unfolded the way they expected a year ago, when Whatley’s fundraising network and Trump’s endorsement made him the favored recruit in a state Republicans considered winnable even in a difficult national environment. Cooper’s advantage appears rooted less in any single issue than in straightforward name recognition built over two decades in statewide office, a dynamic pollsters say is harder for a challenger to dislodge in a compressed midterm cycle than it would be in a presidential year with more media coverage to reach undecided voters.
What a Cooper Win Would Mean
A Cooper victory would hand Democrats one of their four needed net pickups without requiring them to win a single true toss-up seat, since North Carolina had been rated only a ‘lean Republican’ contest for most of the past year. That math is precisely why both national party committees have poured early money into the race rather than waiting for the final stretch, and why North Carolina now sits near the top of most analysts’ lists of states that could determine which party controls the chamber come January.
Down-Ballot Effects Across the State
A blowout at the top of the ticket could also reshape contests further down the ballot, where North Carolina Republicans are simultaneously defending several competitive state legislative seats and at least one US House district that has flipped in each of the past three cycles. Strategists in both parties say a double-digit Cooper win could depress Republican turnout enough to put those down-ballot races in play, a secondary consequence state party officials on both sides are now factoring into their final two weeks of field operations.
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