In North Carolina, straight-ticket voters aren’t a reliable force for down-ballot races, and Election Day trends suggest that low-key, subdued campaigns may play a crucial role in winning office.
In the 2024 general election, North Carolina voters split their support evenly between five Republicans and five Democrats in the 10 Council of State races, highlighting the unpredictable nature of voters in statewide races.
Democrats secured the governor’s seat in addition to offices of the lieutenant governor, attorney general, secretary of state, and superintendent of public instruction. Meanwhile, Republicans secured victories for auditor, commissioner of agriculture, commissioner of insurance, commissioner of labor, and treasurer. Almost all of the winning candidates were able to dodge controversy and stay out of the news, something Jim Stirling, a research fellow at the John Locke Foundation, believes had a meaningful impact on voters.
“The key to the night was the boring candidate, the one without controversy or making headlines for the wrong reasons, was the one with the advantage,” suggested Stirling. “But when neither candidate was really well known or controversial, Republicans had the advantage.”
Republican candidates whose names were consistently thrown into the limelight for controversial remarks, such as Mark Robinson and Michele Morrow, succumbed to Democrats that shied away from the media attention.
“While Trump won by a healthy margin, that was not the case with other Republican statewide candidates,” noted Stirling. “While few were surprised about Robinson losing, it seems that the attempt to tie Robinsons to other candidates had mixed results for Democrats.[Republicans that had controversies or could reasonably be tied to Robinson due to prior notoriety seemed to have lost votes while those who didn’t seem to have had little to no impact.”
While some candidates ran based on their individual merits and vision, others relied on the coattails of others, two diverging approaches that ultimately displayed an engaged voting population that prefers to research candidates individually rather than voting strictly along party lines.
Political consultant David Capen, founder of Capen Consulting, explained in an interview that the candidates who won in North Carolina’s Council of State races focused on running their own campaigns.
“North Carolina voters are smart,” said Capen. “Tuesday’s results indicate that the general electorate prefers candidates who run their own race on their own merits, with a compelling message focused on common-sense policy that is germane to the office they are seeking.”
Josh Stein’s bid for governor received the largest share of support, followed by Republican Luke Farley, who won the Labor Commissioner race with 52.85% of the vote.