Red, Purple & Blue: North Carolina’s Evolving Electorate

When 21-year-old Jake Smith cast his ballot in Wilmington, he could barely believe what he’d just done. He still can’t.

“It sounds silly, but I still can’t believe it was real,” he said. If casting a vote for Kamala Harris, the first Black female presidential candidate, wasn’t historic enough, it was the 21-year-old’s first time participating in a general election. 

As president of the UNC-Wilmington College Democrats, Smith helped lead campus organizers in registering an estimated 1,000 students to vote this semester. He says his generation is fed up with a lack of progress on basic needs like affordable housing and climate change.

“We want policies, not platitudes,” he said, admitting he’s “dangerously optimistic” about this year’s election.

Smith is among an estimated 1 million new voters eligible to participate in the presidential election in North Carolina this year. People between the ages of 18 and 25 make up the highest share of these new registered voters, according to a data analysis by The Assembly, with Gen Z adding more than 434,000 potential voters to the rolls between November 2020 and May 2024. The state’s youngest-ever Democratic Party Chair Anderson Clayton, 26, told PBS News Hour this month that the party has emphasized reaching young voters. “We know that [the] North Carolina youth vote is going to change this election cycle for us,” she said.

Democrats’ hope hinges on the theory that the state’s evolving demographics and partisan preferences will bode in Harris’ favor. Still, it will take robust turnout in groups that tend to lag—the very groups Democrats are relying on, young and unaffiliated voters—for that to materialize.

“The wagon that they’re trying to hitch is bigger than the horse they’re trying to hitch it to,” said Andy Jackson, director of the conservative-leaning John Locke Foundation’s Civitas Center for Public Integrity. “But maybe they’re looking at some data points that I haven’t seen.”

The Harris-Walz North Carolina team says it has closely followed the numbers, especially data on new registered voters. It helped inform the campaign’s decision making as it set up 29 field offices, with locations in rural counties like Gaston and Johnston—historically red areas that have seen Democratic margins shift in recent election cycles. 

Dory MacMillan, spokesperson for the North Carolina Coordinated Campaign, said it has built a powerful coalition with the help of 350 staffers and 40,000 volunteers. “We’ve built a campaign ready to win a close race,” she said.

Signing Up vs. Showing Up

While the number of new voters favors Democrats, past voting patterns favor Republicans.

Democrats have a 113,000-person registration lead over Republicans statewide. Female registered voters, who generally lean more liberal, outnumber men by more than 567,000. Unaffiliated voters, which eclipsed Democrats in 2022 as the largest party, have grown to 2.9 million registrations.

But Republicans have a significant turnout advantage. In 2020, registered Republicans had a 6-point turnout advantage statewide, and unaffiliated voters had a 6-point disadvantage, according to an analysis by Michael Bitzer, director of the Center for North Carolina Politics & Public Service at Catawba College. 

“You have to take into account not just the voter registration dynamics, but ultimately, who shows up to vote,” Bitzer said. “Since 2008, registered Republicans typically have a 5 to 6 point advantage over the turnout rate … If your opposition is 5 to 6 points ahead, that makes up for any percentage advantage in the voter pool.”

Bitzer’s research also shows voters under 40 had a more than 10-point turnout disadvantage in 2020, compared to older voters.

“If you’re going to depend on an unreliable group of voters to deliver you, then you’re really going to have to work the ground game and get those folks registered, and stir them out of bed and get them out to the polling place,” Jackson said.

Democratic strategists frequently invoke the point that the state is becoming more diverse, a trend that typically benefits liberal candidates. But the numbers on that are murky. 

Census and voter registration data since 2020 suggest the state has actually gotten whiter. Voter registration data show the percentage of potential voters who identify as Hispanic or Latino has ticked up slightly, from 3 to 4 percent, while the Asian share has increased by less than a percentage point. The Black voter pool has dipped by about 1 percent. 

However, there’s a big asterisk to these seemingly unmoving metrics: A growing number of potential voters are skipping out on supplying their racial or ethnic identities when they register. “Around 10 percent of the voter pool is this ‘unknown,’” Bitzer said. 

Among the presidential battleground states, North Carolina has been recognized in the national conversation as growing in competitiveness: Despite losing nationally, former President Donald Trump led North Carolina by about 74,500 votes in 2020—a 1.3-point advantage and his narrowest margin of victory in any state.

To cinch the White House this year, North Carolina Democrats are hoping for a repeat of 2008—the year the state picked President Barack Obama, the first time state voters elected a Democrat for president since 1976. It was also Obama’s slimmest margin of victory, a difference of only 14,000 votes.

Gen Z Gets Ready 

Between class changes in mid-October, Smith and other Democratic volunteers stood outside UNCW’s teeming Fisher University Union, manning a campaign booth for Harris. 

“Have you made a plan to vote?” Smith and other volunteers called out to students passing by.

“Not yet.”

“Already did!”

Dozens of students approached the table, asking for buttons or stickers. “We have an incredible ground game,” Smith said. “The response has been overwhelming.” The Harris-Walz campaign has employed two campus field organizers assigned to UNCW and Cape Fear Community College who have aided volunteers in canvassing and registration efforts. 

Across the state, the campaign has more than 80 staffers dedicated to campus outreach.

When Smith, a Wilmington native, first arrived on campus during his freshman year, he noticed college Republicans were hosting local candidate forums, while the college Democrats had no presence. “UNCW College Democrats were nonexistent,” he said. He’s since helped to revive the group and get members involved in local elections. 

The UNCW College Republicans have been less visible this campaign season; Smith said he’s only seen their table once this semester. (The group didn’t respond to an interview request and wasn’t visibly campaigning during The Assembly’s recent visit to campus.)

Because nearly two-thirds of UNCW students are female, Smith is counting on gender dynamics to boost Harris’ chances locally. 

In 2020, New Hanover County voters reversed a pattern of picking Republicans for president when they chose Joe Biden, breaking a 44-year trend. Chris Cooper, director of the Haire Institute for Public Policy Institute at Western Carolina University, has pegged bellwether New Hanover as the No. 1 county to watch this election.

The majority of the new Gen Zers who registered after 2020, like Smith, are local to North Carolina. Meanwhile, most new registered voters age 66 and older were born out-of-state. The top feeder states being New York, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey.

On par with national trends, the political gender divide appears to be widening in North Carolina. 

Newly registered Gen Z men are leaning more Republican than young women, with 28 percent registering as Republicans in N.C. and 20 percent as Democrats. Gen Z women were 19 percent Republican to 29 percent Democrat. The number who chose to register as unaffiliated was nearly identical, at 50 and 51 percent, respectively—a level unprecedented compared to previous generations. 

Rhiley Harris, a 21-year-old junior who recently joined the UNCW College Democrats, said men in his generation are leaning more Republican. “​​I think they’re listening to conservative social media voices telling them, ‘This is what it means to be a strong man,’” he said. “But it’s not true.”

Increased partisanship has also led people with different politics to avoid intermingling, Harris said. “You’re just more likely not to talk to people who don’t agree with you politically,” he said, but added that he personally would be friends with anyone. 

Under a red tent across town at the New Hanover County Senior Center, an early voting hot spot, Bolton Worley, 20, was campaigning for Max Ashworth, a Republican candidate for Superior Court judge. This is Worley’s first season getting involved in politics, and he identifies as a proud conservative. “I think we’ve gone more far right, far left,” he said. “We’re further away from the middle than we were four years ago.”

A Cape Fear Community College student from Raleigh, this will be Worley’s first election as a voter, and he says he and his peers are turned off by the treatment of Trump. ​​“They talk about Trump more than anything,” he said of liberals and media pundits. “You really don’t care about the issues. You just care about this one dude. I don’t hear Republicans slandering Kamala 24/7.”

While the number of newly registered young voters seems impressive, voters over 40 still outnumber those under 40.

“I think this is pretty normal four-year movement,” said WCU’s Cooper. “The question I always have is: Is it really that this generation is different, or are we just looking at people earlier in the lifespan? Is it an age thing, or is it a generation thing? The frustrating part is it’s hard to tease out. The problem is you gotta wait to find out.”

Party of None

Though they’re certainly driving the trend, the youth aren’t alone in their move away from the two major parties. Unaffiliated voters have gained close to half a million additional registrations in North Carolina since 2020, more than five times as many as Republicans, which are up by about 91,000 since the last election. Meanwhile, Democrats have shed about 191,000 registrations. 

Some of the Democratic registration loss can be attributed to the state’s periodic removal of voters who haven’t participated in at least two general election cycles or responded to state mailing inquiries. 

Only four counties have gained Democratic registrations since 2020, and each are fast-growing: Brunswick, Johnston, Chatham, and Wake. At the same time, 88 counties gained Republican registrations. The top Republican registration losses are within the state’s most urban, populous areas. 

All 100 counties gained unaffiliated registrations.

Right behind Gen Z, Millenials are also leading the move away from affiliations. Half of new registered voters ages 25 to 40 since 2020 picked unaffiliated. 

These voters are like free agents, said Jackson—unmoored and often dissatisfied with the major political parties.“Unaffiliateds are different beasts,” he said. 

Most “behave like weak partisans,” according to Jackson, meaning they tend to vote one way but don’t have a strong allegiance to either party.

They also tend to behave in aggregate closer to the partisan tilt of whatever county they live in, Jackson said. “They’re going to be a little more right-leaning in Brunswick County and a little more left-leaning in Wake County.”

The Harris-Walz campaign points to recent national polling that shows it has a slight edge with unaffiliated voters and a major leg up with young voters.

Bucking the Trend

On the eighth day of early voting in Brunswick County, voters formed a line wrapping around the Leland Cultural Arts Center, enduring an hour-long wait in the Saturday morning sun. 

Anthony Shook stood in a U.S. Navy veteran’s hat and a ceremonial shirt depicting an elephant, donkey, and a lamb in the center, a Christian symbol.

An unaffiliated voter, Shook, 72, said he hasn’t voted for a Democratic candidate at the top of the ticket in decades. He’s supporting Republican Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson for governor, but said he planned to vote for some down-ballot Democratic judges.

“Most people vote just straight ticket one way or the other, and I’m like, ‘Just use your head. God gave you a brain for a reason,’” he said. “I’ve seen some boneheads in both parties.”

Brunswick County is bucking the traditional idea that growth is good for Democrats. Though it’s the state’s fastest-growing county, with 23,000 new residents since 2020, it’s remained stubbornly Republican. 

“People will tell ya, ‘The damn Yankees are coming down and bringing their politics with them.’ I don’t know that that’s true. I mean, I’m a damn Yankee,” said Mike Forte, a county commissioner who has served on the all-Republican board for eight years. “We’re still a pretty red county.”

Brunswick and Onslow counties, both suburbs of Wilmington, added the first and second-most new registered Republicans since 2020, according to The Assembly’s analysis, despite being the 13th- and 19th-largest counties by population size. As of Monday, Brunswick had the second-highest early voting turnout rate statewide.

The greater Wilmington area has become a retirement mecca, and Brunswick is the state’s oldest county by median age. It’s also aging the fastest, driven by the influx of older newcomers.

Still, Democrats are putting in more work here than they did in years past, said Sharon Herzog, a Brunswick County Democratic Party volunteer.

“It was with some trepidation that I even put a [Hilary] Clinton sign out, I might have been the only one on my street,” said Herzog. “Now on our street, people are putting up signs, Harris-Walz signs, which shocked me in a good way. Before, you felt so intimidated because you felt you were such a minority.”

Mike Rush, third vice-chair of the Brunswick County Democratic Party, said when he first got involved, “None of the Democratic precincts were organized.” After 2016, the party coalesced and restructured, and now attempts to at least run candidates in local races where Republicans previously would often run unopposed. 

“If we can get 50 percent of the unaffiliated vote, I think we’re going to be in good shape,” Rush said. “If we can get an above average turnout here in Brunswick County, we can make a big, big difference on what the outcome is here in the state and the federal races.”

Small shifts in unique segments of the electorate—Black male voters, Republicans who voted against Trump in the primary (251,000 voted for former South Carolina Nikki Haley here last March), rural voters—each could each have huge consequences for election results, said Bitzer, the political scientist.

“You can slice and dice the electorate in numerous ways,” he said. How you interpret it, he continued, “all depends on which side of the political aisle you’re on.”

Bitzer’s preferred methodology for predicting next week’s winner in North Carolina?

Heads Harris, tails Trump. 

Johanna F. Still is The Assembly’s Wilmington editor. She previously covered economic development for Greater Wilmington Business Journal and was the assistant editor at Port City Daily.