Republican North Carolina Senate candidate Michael Whatley’s campaign is facing a precipitous decline in support in his quest to secure one of the country’s most competitive congressional seats, according to a new poll.
Whatley is running against former North Carolina governor Roy Cooper, a Democrat, in the 2026 elections. Several polls last year had the pair in a close race, as the Republican Party fights to keep the seat under GOP control.
The momentum appears to have shifted significantly in Cooper’s favor, according to the poll from the right-leaning Tipp Insights for the League of American Workers. The poll handed the former governor a 24-point lead over Whatley. Of those surveyed, 54% viewed Cooper favorably, compared to Whatley’s 25%.
Whatley announced his campaign last July, when early polling indicated he trailed Cooper by six points. He has prioritized targeting Cooper’s record as governor, including policies on crime and immigration, particularly singling out the fatal stabbing of Iryna Zarutska by a repeat offender and another recent stabbing by an illegal immigrant as proof that his Democratic opponent is “soft-on-crime” and unfit for the Senate.
But Whatley’s messaging appears to be falling flat, according to the latest polling.
One of the survey’s questions asked residents how Zarutska’s death on Charlotte’s light rail system, “involving a repeat criminal offender,” affected their chances of backing a Democratic candidate. Forty-six percent said it had no effect. Thirty percent said they were less likely to support a Democrat, 12% said more likely, and 12% said they were unsure.
Whatley’s close alliance with the Trump administration throughout his campaign could also be negatively affecting his campaign, based on the poll results. The majority of respondents said they believe the White House is doing a “poor” or “unacceptable” job at reducing inflation, which they also named as one of their top three issues in the Senate race.
The North Carolina Democratic Party has sought to brand Whatley as deeply lacking in charisma, a criticism echoed by Don Brown, a Republican challenging Whatley for the GOP nomination. Critics have also perpetuated the narrative that Whatley was handpicked by Washington insiders. Before he launched the Senate campaign after being personally recruited by Trump to run, Whatley led the Republican National Committee.
“No matter how much Whatley can raise, you simply cannot buy excitement for a candidate,” Brown said last week.
Brown had previously framed Trump’s efforts to promote Whatley during the early stages of the race, including through a joint North Carolina rally just before Christmas, as proof that GOP leadership is worried about his campaign.
“Read the tea leaves,” Brown told NBC News last month.“Why would you have to bring him [Trump] in this early unless you’re seeing [poll] numbers that concern them?”
Early polling on the race last summer showed Cooper leading by 6 points. A survey conducted last November by High Point University’s Survey Research Center handed Democrats a 5-point lead. Another November poll conducted by Harper Polling found Cooper held a roughly 9-point lead.
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Candidates still have nine full months of campaigning left before the general election, offering Whatley ample opportunity to turn his fortunes around should he win the primary. Republicans remain hopeful that an uptick in North Carolina’s GOP voter registrations will make the party more competitive, come November.
The latest Tipps Insight poll surveyed 1,512 registered voters and was conducted from Jan. 12 to Jan. 15. It has a margin of error of +/- 2.7%.