Political experts say North Carolina's Senate race next year could see around $500 million in campaign spending, and the contest between former Gov. Roy Cooper and Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Whatley could set a new record for the most expensive Senate race in the country.
Past U.S. Senate races in North Carolina have cost more than $200 million. Democratic political strategist Kimberly Reynolds told the WUNC Politics Podcast that voters can expect an onslaught of ads that goes far beyond previous elections.
"With these two candidates, and their connections and their ability and infrastructure to go raise money, and the outside interests that see North Carolina as a must-win for 2027 for the Democrats to take back the Senate, I think it will way surpass that," said Reynolds, a former N.C. Democratic Party executive director who leads the firm Maven Strategies.
Jim Blaine, a Republican political strategist with the firm The Differentiators, previously worked for Senate leader Phil Berger. He's predicting $400-500 million will be spent as North Carolina gets a national focus.
"There just aren't a lot of places at the national level where money can go this year," Blaine said. "There's a limited playing field, if the Democrats have any chance of taking back the Senate ... they have to win North Carolina to have any chance. There just aren't a lot of other competitive races."
Reynolds says voters will be sick of the ads by the time Election Day arrives. "You're gonna smash your television," she joked. "Come about September of next year, you're just gonna see a lot of TVs in the streets and phones."
Whatley's challenges as a candidate
Whatley launched his campaign for U.S. Senate Thursday with a strong endorsement from President Donald Trump, who said on his Truth Social site that Whatley is "one of the most capable executives in our country."
But he enters the race with far less name recognition than Cooper. While Whatley led the North Carolina GOP for several years before moving to the national level, a new poll from Emerson College found that more than two-thirds of North Carolina voters have no opinion about him.
"Whatley is very undefined, and that is both an opportunity for Whatley to position himself, but also because he's more of a blank slate, Cooper and the Democratic Party will have a chance to define him in the way he wants to," Blaine said.
Reynolds says Democrats will tie Whatley to Trump and the president's actions so far, including the impacts of the so-called "Big, Beautiful Bill."
Cooper's challenges as a candidate
The same poll found that about 51% have a favorable opinion of Cooper, while only 16% of those surveyed had no opinion about him. The poll ultimately gave Cooper a slight lead over Whatley. Reynolds says he has an advantage as the race gets started.
"Roy Cooper doesn't have to spend his money introducing himself to a lot of people, because they already know him and feel one way or another," he said.
But Cooper's decades in office — including time as governor, attorney general and as a state legislator — will give opposition researchers plenty to work with. Blaine says Republicans will likely highlight Cooper's missteps on things like a rape-kit processing backlog and sluggish hurricane recovery programs run by his administration.
"In this day and age, a candidate with a long record is almost always hurt by that record more than they are helped, especially someone that's been in office as long as Cooper," he said, adding that the GOP will also tie Cooper to more polarizing Democratic Party figures at the national level.
Hear more analysis of the race from Jim Blaine and Kimberly Reynolds on this week's episode of the WUNC Politics Podcast here.
