Toplines
Heading into Election Day, Democrats have a bigger Mail and In-Person Early Voting (IPEV) lead than they did in any of the previous four elections:
2026 Mail + IPEV: D+343,546
2024 Mail + IPEV: R+33,709
2022 Mail + IPEV: D+157,930
2020 Mail + IPEV: D+260,102
2018 Mail + IPEV: D+250,368
Democrats’ margin over Republicans is 93,178 votes greater than it was in 2018, a year in which they gained 9 seats in the State House and 6 seats in the State Senate. Those were the Democrats’ biggest gains in each chamber this century.
At this point, there is a high likelihood of victory for the Democrats’ statewide candidates (Roy Cooper, Anita Earls, John Arrowood, Toby Hampson, and Christine Walczyk). But control of the legislature, the fate of the deceptive constitutional amendments, and the defensibility of statewide victories from spurious litigation still hang in the balance of Election Day turnout. Both parties have every incentive to sprint for the finish as hard as they can.
Let’s break it down.
Registration, Party Split, and Unaffiliated Behavior
North Carolina election results are driven by unaffiliated voters, whose turnout is high this year.
People call North Carolina a “50/50” state. The reality is that we live in a 30/30/40 state:
30% Democrats
30% Republicans
40% Unaffiliated
There are approximately 3.1 million unaffiliated voters in North Carolina. The electorate is 8 points more unaffiliated today than in 2018, and there is no sign that Democrats or Republicans are getting more popular with these voters. A September 2026 poll showed that 75% of them viewed the Democratic Party unfavorably and 76% of them viewed the Republican party unfavorably.
Here’s how they differ from the rest of the electorate:
Unaffiliated voters are younger than affiliated voters. At a median age of 43 years old, they’re about ten years younger than Democrats (median 52) and Republicans (median 53). That’s because 17% of unaffiliated voters are 18-25, while just 10% of Democrats and 9% of Republicans fall into the same age group.
They’re mostly white. While they’re about 30 points whiter than Democrats (74% to 43%), they’re also about 20 points less white than Republicans (93%).
They’re the least consistent voters. 63% of unaffiliated voters meet Carolina Forward’s “low-propensity” voter criteria: voted in 0 or 1 of the last 3 federal elections, or voted in 2020 and 2024 but not 2022. We’ve calibrated our definition to catch the voters we think are least likely to vote in midterms. You may see other analysts define the term differently.
Generally speaking, unaffiliated voters in North Carolina split in accordance with that year’s vibes and vote against whichever party is in power in that cycle.
Youth Behavior
More young voters have voted than in previous midterms, and the data so far favors Democrats.
This year, voters aged 18-25 cast 7.1% of the Mail and IPEV accepted prior to Election Day. That’s an increase of 1.9 points since 2022, when they cast 5.2% of accepted Mail and IPEV ballots, and 1.2 pts since 2018, when they cast 5.9% of accepted Mail and IPEV ballots. In raw votes, that works out to:
2026 Mail + IPEV (18-25): 201,143 2022 Mail + IPEV (18-25): 110,903 2018 Mail + IPEV (18-25): 120,440
Broken down by party, voters aged 18-25 cast 7.5% of Democratic ballots, 3.1% of Republican ballots, and 9.7% of unaffiliated ballots so far. That’s a significant advantage for Democrats. If it translates to unaffiliated voter behavior, that will be a critical swing for Democratic performance compared to 2024, when Republican voters aged 18-25 ultimately outvoted Democratic voters aged 18-25 by 1,600 ballots.
Voting by Race
White turnout is down, Black turnout and Hispanic/Latino turnout are up.
Party affiliation doesn’t necessarily dictate who people choose when they’re casting their ballot. Neither does their race. But it can help us guess at what is going on, particularly because 93% of registered Republicans are white, and white turnout is down.
We contextualized Democratic performance this cycle against the decreasing share of registered voters affiliated with the Democratic Party (down to 30% in 2026 from 38% in 2018). We need to do the same for North Carolina’s racial demographics.
Here’s how North Carolina’s registered voter pool’s racial composition has changed since 2018:
White: 68% → 63% (-5)
Black: 22% → 19% (-3)
Asian: 1% → 2% (+1)
Other: 4% → 6% (+2)
No race listed: 4% → 10% (+6)
[Hispanic/Latino: 2.8% → 4.7% (+2)]
The biggest change is that more voters are declining to provide information about their race when they register to vote. The second biggest changes are that White voters and Black voters both make up smaller shares of total registered voters than they did in 2018.
North Carolina registration paperwork includes an ethnicity section that asks voters if they identify as Hispanic/Latino. The share of registered voters checking that box has increased from 2.8% in 2018 to 4.7% today.
Here’s how the share of ballots cast by race has changed since 2018:
2026 Mail + IPEV: 66.4% White - 21.2% Black - 6.4% No race - 4.3% Other - 1.7% Asian - [3.4% Hispanic/Latino]
2024 Mail + IPEV: 69.1% White - 17.8% Black - 7.6% No race - 3.8% Other - 1.6% Asian - [2.9%Hispanic/Latino]
2022 Mail + IPEV: 72.4% White - 18.6% Black - 5.3% No Race - 2.5% Other - 1.2% Asian - [1.6% Hispanic/Latino]
2020 Mail + IPEV: 66.2% White - 19.5% Black - 9.7% No Race - 3.2% Other - 1.1% Asian - [2.3% Hispanic/Latino]
2018 Mail + IPEV: 71.3% White - 21.7% Black - 3.3% No Race - 2.6% Other - 1.1% Asian - [1.6% Hispanic/Latino]
Although both Black and White voters make up less of the pool of registered voters than they used to, Black voters have cast 21.2% of this year’s Mail and IPEV so far, nearly matching the 21.7% of ballots they cast through the same point in 2018. White voters, on the other hand, have cast just 66.4% of the Mail and IPEV ballots so far, down about 5 points from the 71.3% of ballots they had cast at this point in 2018.
Low-Propensity Voters
180,680 more low-propensity Democrats have voted than low-propensity Republicans so far.
2026 Mail + IPEV (Low-Propensity): 323,874 D - 143,194 R - 323,658 U (D+180,680)
2024 Mail + IPEV (Low-Propensity): 413,886 D - 450,734 R - 556,199 U (R+36,848)
2022 Mail + IPEV (Low-Propensity): 177,667 D - 162,575 R - 180,815 U (D+15,092)
2020 Mail + IPEV (Low-Propensity): 566,727 D - 508,915 R - 605,942 U (D+57,812)
2018 Mail + IPEV (Low-Propensity): 270,586 D - 185,492 R - 233,192 U (D+85,094)
Democrats’ low-propensity turnout advantage against Republicans is 95,586 votes greater than it was at this point in 2018. Republican low-propensity turnout as a share of votes cast has collapsed. In 2018, 30% of their Mail and IPEV turnout by this point had come from low propensity voters.
That number is just 19% this year.
Democrats, on the other hand, have nearly matched their 2018 proportions. 30% of their Mail and IPEV ballots belong to low-propensity voters, compared to 31% at the same point in 2018.
Democrats also have a substantial lead with new voters – first-time registrants in North Carolina. 19% of the Democratic ballots cast so far come from new voters, compared to just 13% for Republicans. Those numbers were 17% for Democrats and 16% for Republicans in 2018 – a 2 point gain for Democrats and a 3 point decrease for Republicans.
Competitive Congressional Races
The Cook Political Report identifies two competitive Congressional races: NC-11 and NC-01.
NC-11 is currently held by Republican Chuck Edwards, who dropped out of his campaign for re-election after the House voted to censure him for “persistent unprofessional and inappropriate conduct” toward female staffers. Democrat Jamie Ager is now competing with Republican Jennifer Balkcom to replace Edwards in Congress.
Democrats are currently leading Mail and IPEV by 6 points. Republicans hold an 8 point edge among registered voters in the district, but the biggest change since 2018 is in the share of ballots cast by unaffiliated voters, which has increased from 32.2% to 41.1%. This is a highly competitive district.
The other competitive battle is between Rep. Don Davis, the Democratic incumbent in NC-01, and Laurie Buckhout, his Republican challenger. Democrats are currently leading Mail and IPEV in that district by 13 points. They hold a 3 point advantage over Republicans in voter registration.
Competitive State Legislative Races
Ignoring the noise in last-minute polling, we’ve taken a conservative approach to designating “battleground” districts. Ours are those with district leans of R+5 to D+5.
To establish a district’s “partisan lean,” we take the average performance for Democratic Council of State candidates in that district in 2024 (minus Governor Josh Stein, whose performance was anomalously strong) and subtract from it their average performance statewide. If their average performance statewide were 49% of the vote, and they received an average of 51% in your district, you’d be living in a D+2 district. If, on the other hand, they received an average of 49% statewide, and just 44% in your district, you’d be living in an R+5 district.
You can check out the list of “battleground” districts in our District Lean Tracker, see where your district falls, then dig into what we know about the accepted ballots from mail and in-person early voting at our Turnout Tracker.
