State senator Chuck Edwards isn’t well-known outside of North Carolina, but that won’t be the case for long if his bid to knock off Representative Madison Cawthorn in an upcoming Republican primary election succeeds.
Voters in North Carolina’s heavily Republican 11th congressional district are unlikely to choose a Democrat in November. The mountainous district, which covers 15 counties in the western end of the state and borders Tennessee, South Carolina, and Georgia, last elected a Democrat, Heath Shuler, in 2010. The Cook Partisan Voter Index rating of the district is R+9, meaning it is estimated nine points more Republican than the nationwide average. Even as an inexperienced first-time candidate running for the open seat in 2020, Cawthorn won by twelve points. So the May 17 primary is likely to decide who holds the seat come next year. Early voting in the eight-way race begins today — Democrats cannot vote in the primary, but unaffiliated voters are allowed to register as Republicans to cast ballots — and Edwards needs to hold Cawthorn under 30 percent of the vote to set up a head-to-head runoff in June.
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