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More people than ever are listing their party choice as “no thanks” in North Carolina.
The number of voters registered as unaffiliated continues to climb, now at 2.7 million as of Tuesday.
Unaffiliated voters first eclipsed Democrats as the state’s largest affiliation in 2022. Since 2020, the unaffiliated “party” has added more than 453,000 voters–a 20 percent gain. These voters tend to skew younger, and most were born outside of the state.
Republicans have added about 164,000 registered voters over the last 4 years, while Democrats lost 114,000. Third-party groups have also gained some traction, with Libertarians picking up more than 10,000 and the new “No Labels” party adding nearly 8,000.
The shifts mirror national ideological trends rejecting polarization, said Aaron King, an associate political science professor at the University of North Carolina at Wilmington.
But the changes don’t necessarily mean there’s a growing appetite for more centrist candidates.
“If the true unaffiliated voters were really driving the political landscape, you would see political parties and the candidates respond more to them,” he said. “And I don’t really think we see that happening… They’re still definitely catering to the ideological wings.”
North Carolina is one of seven states that allows unaffiliated voters to choose their ballot.
In the 2020 primary, more unaffiliated voters chose a Democratic ballot. During the early voting period for this primary, more unaffiliated voters chose a Republican ballot, about 128,000 compared to about 69,000 Democratic ballots, according to state data.
Typically, Democrats tend to vote early, while Republicans are known to show up in droves on Election Day. Data on which ballots unaffiliated voters chose Tuesday won’t be available for a few weeks, according to a State Board of Elections data analyst.
While the perk of a ballot choice may be a reason to remain unaffiliated, King said he suspects most voters aren’t that strategic.
As much as people say they don’t like partisan labels, King said they can function as a shortcut that helps them navigate politics. “In a primary election when you grab the Republican ballot, and there’s 10 people listed for lieutenant governor, ‘Well geez, what the hell am I supposed to do with this?”
Many political strategists and experts believe unaffiliated voters tend to favor one party or another, leaving political campaigns to debate whether it’s worth spending time and money to try and win them over.
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.