Support for Donald Trump is at a historic low in North Carolina and others on the GOP ticket might go down in flames along with him.
Republican Gov. Pat McCrory is still suffering after overwhelming opposition to the state's anti-trans so-called "bathroom bill" that barred people from using the bathroom of their preferred gender. The bill sparked boycotts and has cost the state over $500 million as of July and that was before the NBA confirmed it was pulling the All-Star Game out of the state for 2017.
But in an interview with a North Carolina Republican strategist, BuzzFeed forecasts a downfall for the party that has been in power since the tea party takeover.
“It certainly has the potential to be one of the worst elections we’ve seen in a long time,” Carter Wrenn, a veteran GOP strategist in the state, told Tarini Parti.
Trump's latest flubs trying to appeal to African-American voters certainly doesn't do him any favors in the state. Add to that the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals struck down the state's controversial voter I.D. law, calling it "discriminatory." It's unclear if the U.S. Supreme Court will take it up before the November election.
“I do think that people need to be very open-eyed about what could potentially go wrong,” a top Republican involved in party conversations told Parti. “The sky isn’t falling, but it’s cloudy and we need to get in gear. It’s going to require a different level of organization and intervening from the top of the ticket than we’ve seen, and it’s going to require support from outside groups.”
Charlotte businessman Richard Alexander set up N.C. Means Jobs to run outside ads touting McCrory's business sense. The Koch Brothers are investing heavily as well with Americans for Prosperity knocking doors promoting McCrory's opposition to Medicaid expansion.
The Trump campaign, by contrast, doesn't have field offices set up in the state yet 75 days out from the November 8 election. The N.C. GOP calls the latest NBC polls for North Carolina showing Trump down 9 points nothing but BS. “What I’m hearing is normal, healthy discussions around election time," executive director Dallas Woodhouse explained. Still, about 15 percent of the GOP hasn't committed to voting for their party's nominee.
“The electorate is as fluid is as I have ever seen it,” said GOP strategist Andy Yates. “I wouldn’t be surprised if Trump won by more points than Romney did or lost by more than 10 points.”
But ads from the Clinton campaign as well as her super PAC are flooding the airwaves. Both U.S. Senate candidates went up on television with ads as well. Democrat Deborah Ross is largely unknown in the state, but thanks to the Trump anchor, she's now tied with her GOP rival Sen. Richard Burr.
“I was a Republican for 50 years, but then the Republican Party got so out of control and angry I just couldn’t be a part of it,” Mary Miller, a retired Winston-Salem resident, told BuzzFeed.
Democratic strategist Brad Crone summed it up, "I really believe a tsunami is building."
