Source: Spectrum News
It’s been 16 years since a Democratic presidential candidate won North Carolina. Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign is devoting the resources necessary to turn the Tar Heel state blue again.
Most of the recent polling of the presidential race in North Carolina shows the same thing – a neck-and-neck race that will be extremely tight when the votes are tallied up. The matchup between Harris and Donald Trump may end up being even closer than Trump’s 2020 North Carolina victory when he defeated President Joe Biden by 1.4%, or about 74,000 votes.
“We know that we’ve built a campaign that is all across the state that is meeting voters where they are,” Harris North Carolina campaign manager David Berrios told Spectrum News.
The campaign told Spectrum News they have 27 Democratic coordinated field offices in 24 counties, including usual Republican strongholds like Cabarrus, Gaston and Jackson counties. It’s in those rural areas that the Harris team is hoping to narrow the margins, but they must do so while running up the votes in the Democratic strongholds of the state’s biggest cities like Raleigh, Charlotte, Durham and Greensboro.
“We’re investing in communities, yes, like Wake and Meck, but all over the state,” Berrios said.
The Harris campaign said it has 250 paid staffers in the state, which is almost four times the 65 Trump campaign employees here, Spectrum News reported.
More than 26,000 volunteers have signed on to volunteer in North Carolina since Harris got the nomination, the campaign said. Democrats are also employing paid staff on college campuses to energize students to get to the polls.
Political observers are impressed by the campaign’s efforts in North Carolina.
“She’s got an even better infrastructure built into the ground than Barack Obama did in 2008,” Catawba College politics professor Michael Bitzer told Spectrum News.
While the Harris campaign’s investment into the state is impressive, the fact remains that Trump has won North Carolina in the last two elections and could win it again this fall.
“We know that this is going to be a close election. We’ve built a campaign, built to scale, we started it earlier than ever before and we feel confident in the level of infrastructure and the winning message in the candidate,” Berrios said.
Harris’ campaign has put in the time, money and effort to win North Carolina. It will be up to the voters to ensure they do.
Absentee by-mail voting is underway in North Carolina, voter registration ends on Oct. 11, early voting begins on Oct. 17 and ends on Nov. 2, and Election Day is on Nov. 5. Click here for voting information from the North Carolina State Board of Elections.
Remember, a valid photo ID is needed to vote in person, you can view a list of approved IDs here.
