NC Primary Election Results: Biden, Cunningham Trounce Opponents

MOORESVILLE, NC — Super Tuesday was a soggy one for much of North Carolina, but that did little to dampen voter turnout for the primary election. North Carolina voters took to the polls to determine their party’s candidate for a host of state and local races — and, for some voters, the candidate they hoped to see as the Democratic challenger to President Donald Trump in November.

Early projections indicated that North Carolina voters overwhelmingly chose former Vice President Joe Biden, according to Politico and major networks.

At 10 p.m. Sanders sounded upbeat as he spoke to supporters in Vermont.

“Tonight I tell you with aboslute confidence, we’re going to win the Democratic nomination and we are going to defeat the most dangerous president in the history of this country,” Sanders said. “We are going to win, we are going to defeat Trump, because we are putting together an unprecedented grassroots, multiracial, multigenerational movement.”

Polls throughout North Carolina were scheduled to remain open until 7:30 p.m. Around 7 p.m., however, the North Carolina State Board of Elections announced that statewide results would be delayed by at least 40 minutes after voting was extended until 8:10 p.m. at a Forsyth County precinct.

Here are some early return highlights:

• In the governor’s race, Gov. Roy Cooper won the Democratic nomination and Dan Forest won the Republican nomination, according to the AP.
• In the race for U.S. Senate, Sen. Thom Tillis won the Republican nomination and Cal Cunningham bested Erica Smith to win the Democratic nomination.

See results for all races via the North Carolina State Board of Elections website below.

By midday in Iredell County, voting was proceeding “fairly steady everywhere,” Becky Galliher, director of Iredell County Board of Elections, told Patch.

“We’ve learned in Iredell County, the worse the weather is, the better people come out” to vote, she said.

While final election day turnout numbers aren’t expected until after polls close at 7:30 p.m., turnout was already high In Iredell County when it came to early voting. More than 15,000 ballots were cast in the county during “One Stop” voting, which wrapped up Feb. 29 — about a 32 percent increase over early voting numbers in the 2016 primary election.

In this election, increased interest was likely due to the school bond referendum included on the ballot, Galliher said. Iredell County commissioners, as well as members of county school systems, say the $115 million school bond package is needed to keep pace with growth in the southern end of the county.

Related: Super Tuesday Results: Bloomberg Now Part Of Sanders, Biden Race

Outside a Mooresville voting precinct at Peninsula Baptist Church, the parking lot was full around lunchtime Tuesday as a cold rain steadily fell.

Mooresville resident and Republican voter Marianne Campbell said that for this election, she made sure to go online and do her homework about candidates before coming to the polls, something she hasn’t always done before. With two grandchildren in Iredell County schools, her family is concerned about potential classroom overcrowding. She was motivated to come out and vote in favor of school bonds.

The school bond issue was also a top concern for Mooresville Democrat Erica Dechene.

“I went to Lake Norman High School. I know how large it was then, and I know it’s grown even larger since then. I really wanted to vote yes on that so we can build another high school,” Dechene said.

“It’s the primary. I’m not going to not vote,” she said of the dreary weather. “I chose to vote today — specifically on today instead of early voting— because it’s just more fun to vote on election day,” she said, adding, “And then you get your sticker.”

Dechene said in the lead-up to Tuesday’s race, she was struck by how few local ads she had seen in comparison to those of presidential candidates. “I sat down this morning with a sample ballot and Googled each individual person I’m going to vote for,” she said. However, she still remained undecided between former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg or Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders.

Casting a vote for the Democratic presidential candidate was the primary motivating factor for Mooresville voter Christopher Holland, who said he’s most concerned about issues such as student loan debt and public housing for homeless in the area.

“Bernie Sanders is the most electable in my eyes,” Holland said.

“Personally, Biden is not my favorite,” he added. “There are a few things that don’t sit well with me with Biden in general,” Holland said.

And should Biden claim the party’s nomination, would Holland support him?

“Honestly, that might be one of those situations where I’m not sure,” Holland said.

According to a recent poll, Dechene and Holland are representative of many Democratic voters in North Carolina.

Leading into Tuesday’s vote, one statewide poll in North Carolina found the top three contenders for the Democratic primary — Biden, Sanders and Bloomberg — were neck and neck in the race for the state’s 110 pledged delegates.

According to a Meredith College poll released late last week, 17.7 percent of voters favored Sanders, with 17.2 percent saying they intended to vote for Biden. In a narrow third place, according to the poll, was Bloomberg with 17 percent voter support.

By Tuesday, the winds were once again changing among Democratic voters in the state, and in Biden’s favor, according to a poll conducted by Civitas Institute, a conservative group. The Civitas poll indicated the former vice president could command nearly 45 percent of the vote in North Carolina, the Charlotte Observer reported.

Trump Card
Monday evening, President Trump flew to Charlotte to put his thumb on the scale in North Carolina by holding a massive rally for an estimated 10,000 supporters at the Bojangles’ Coliseum.

“We like to go the night before of their primaries,” Trump told the crowd, the Charlotte Observer reported. “We like to do a little trolling.” Joining Trump on the rally stage were North Carolina Republican Sen. Thom Tillis and South Carolina Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham, both of whom are facing steep challenges in their re-election bids.

Despite the presidential attention on North Carolina, the big news from election night will likely come from other parts of the country, said one political analyst.

“I think North Carolina’s Super Tuesday coverage may get drowned out by California (and where Sanders seems to be doing very well) and Texas (that could be the highlight of the evening), but we’ll have to wait and see Tuesday evening,” Michael Bitzer, who teaches political science at Catawba College, told Patch.

The Democratic presidential race is just one of many Bitzer focused on Tuesday. “Certainly the Democratic U.S. Senate primary contest: How big is [Cal] Cunningham’s win over [Erica] Smith, or is it much closer than others think? We just don’t know. Everyone is expecting Dan Forrest to win the GOP gubernatorial nomination. The lower-ballot Council of State races haven’t gotten a lot of attention,” he said, adding that he expects there could be a drop-off with that races because voters just simply skip them.

Primary Results, via North Carolina State Board of Elections: