By BILL BARROW Associated Press
President Donald Trump will travel to North Carolina on Wednesday to campaign with Republican Senate nominee Michael Whatley as the former national party chairman tries to shore up his campaign against Democratic former Gov. Roy Cooper.
The trip marks Trump’s first campaign rally since his unusual midterm convention in Dallas. The president, despite voter frustrations over the Iran war and his economic leadership, has promised dozens more trips ahead of Election Day. Trump’s involvement creates a balancing act for Republicans like Whatley, who will depend on the president’s core supporters to turn out while also trying to appeal to moderates and disaffected conservatives unhappy with the direction of the country.
Whatley was the president’s pick for the Senate race and Trump’s pick to lead the Republican National Committee before that. Republicans viewed him as a strong recruit to hold the seat being left open by Sen. Thom Tillis, who decided to retire after clashing with the president last year. But Whatley, who is making his first bid for public office, has trailed Cooper in fundraising in recent months and polling from over the summer showed Cooper with at least a slight lead.
Trump has acknowledged the challenging landscape but believes his presence will be a clear boost.
“In North Carolina, you have a little more difficult case, because people don’t quite get it, but they’re going to find out,” Trump said during his keynote speech in Dallas.
Democrats have not won a Senate contest in the state since 2008, and Trump has carried North Carolina three times since. The seat is critical to Democrats’ effort to flip control of the Senate. Cooper was perhaps Democrats’ best recruit this cycle, having never lost a statewide race in North Carolina through four terms as attorney general and two terms as governor.
Republican pollster Paul Shumaker, who worked for Tillis’s and North Carolina Sen. Ted Budd’s campaigns, said Trump will energize Republicans who may not be as excited about the campaign as Democrats. But he noted that registered Democrats and Republicans in North Carolina are split about evenly, while independent voters outnumber both. That cohort of more than 3.5 million voters, he said, are more concerned about the economy, an issue where Trump is weaker than he was in 2024, than with crime or immigration, issues where North Carolina Republicans might still have an advantage over Democrats.
“They see the White House more focused on everything but the economy,” Shumaker said. “So that narrative has to change to give them a path here in North Carolina.”
Whatley, for his part, has not distanced himself from Trump. During a brief speech in Dallas, he praised Trump’s agenda, especially the tax cuts included in his “big beautiful bill” last year. But instead of lavishing praise on the president himself, he spent most of his time unloading on Cooper as soft on crime and bad for North Carolinians’ wallets.
“Under Roy Cooper’s reign, North Carolina became the most expensive state in the nation for health care costs,” he said, countering the former governor’s emphasis on the economy under Trump, especially gas and grocery prices.
Cooper’s campaign pushed back against Whatley’s criticisms and noted that the Republican has faced scrutiny for recently having a convicted sex offender offer the opening prayer at one of his campaign events.
Whatley, meanwhile, is leaning heavily on Trump and national Republican donors to reach voters on TV and online. According to data from AdImpact, which tracks campaign advertising, total Republican spending on the contest has topped $50 million, while Democrats have spent almost $35.2 million, with Trump’s MAGA Inc. and other conservative PACs accounting for the overall Republican advantage.
Cooper has no public events Wednesday but the state Democratic Party plans a news conference aimed at keeping attention on inflation under Trump.