(The Center Square) – Ten consecutive weeks of declining North Carolina voter registration totals for Democrats finally ended Saturday.
What did not come with it were the increasing gap to rival Republicans or any relent by the dominant voting bloc of the unaffiliated registrations. In fact, if each of the next three weeks’ change is like the one just past, Republicans would for the first time lead the longtime party leader in the pivotal battleground state.
Candidate filing for the 2026 midterms begins at noon on Monday of next week.
Republicans chewed into the Democrats’ edge by another 1,778 registrations in updated totals released Saturday by the State Board of Elections. The difference today is a mere 3,758, and statistical rounding puts each at 30.3% of the state’s more than 7.6 million registrations.
Democrats lead by 0.04934%.
And both parties are getting boat-raced by voters choosing to be independent. The weekly gains were 8,686 by those unaffiliated, 2,741 by Republicans and 963 by Democrats. The independent bloc has 643,360 more registrations than the Grand Old Party, and 639,602 more than Democrats.
Total voter registrations eclipsed 7.8 million on Election Day 2024; routine maintenance throughout the year is a key contributing factor to the volume changes. This fall was an off-year election cycle, when 91 of 100 counties had municipal races.
A mere 16 years ago Democrats were in eight of 10 seats for the Council of State and commanded 30-20 and 68-52 majorities in the General Assembly. Today those figures are 5-5 in the executive offices, and Republicans have held advantages of 30-20 in the Senate and 71-49 in the House of Representatives this session.
A year ago on the third Saturday after Election Day in November, the state was counting more than 7.8 million voters registered. The split was 38.7% unaffiliated (2.9 million), 32.1% Democrats (2.4 million) and 30.8% Republicans (2.3 million).
North Carolina is considered a legitimate battleground state on the national level, purple in hue rather than blue for Democrats or red for Republicans. Each has been around more than 150 years, the Grand Old Party (1867) more than a half century behind its rival (1828).
THANKSGIVING PRICES DECLINE FOR THIRD STRAIGHT YEAR THIS HOLIDAY SEASON
From the every two years elections of 1930 to 1982, Democrats were below 43 of the 50 state Senate seats just twice (won 38 in 1969, won 35 in 1973) and didn’t have fewer than 30 until only getting 26 in the 1994 cycle. From 1930 to 1982 in the House, Democrats had fewer than 102 of the 120 just six times with 85 won in 1974 the worst.
Three decades ago at Election Day 1992, North Carolinians elected Democrats to all 10 Council of State positions and majorities of 39-11 in the state Senate and 78-42 in the House.