North Carolina Republicans have one of the clearest paths to a Senate pickup in the entire country heading into 2026, but a new poll suggests they may be walking away from it if Senate Republicans don’t deliver on the SAVE America Act.

A McLaughlin & Associates survey of 333 likely North Carolina general election voters conducted April 6-9 paints a sobering picture: the Republican base in North Carolina is motivated, engaged, and fully prepared to stay home if the Senate fails to act on election integrity legislation that has already passed the House.

Among North Carolina Republican voters, 12.1% said they would be less likely to vote if Senate Republicans fail to pass the Save America Act. Another 12.3% said they weren’t sure whether they’d show up. North Carolina showed the highest “less likely to vote” response among general election voters of any state surveyed at 8.6% — a signal that even beyond the Republican base, the state’s electorate takes Senate inaction seriously.

Perhaps most damaging for Republican candidates: 47.6% of all North Carolina voters said they would be less likely to support a senator who voted against the SAVE America Act. That is the highest anti-opposition number of any state in the poll — and it means that in North Carolina, voting against this bill doesn’t just depress your base. It actively costs you votes across the broader electorate.

Making matters worse for North Carolina Republicans, their own senior senator is part of the problem. Sen. Thom Tillis has emerged as one of the most vocal Republican opponents of the SAVE America Act in the Senate; a position that puts him directly at odds with the 92.8% of North Carolina voters who believe only U.S. citizens should vote in federal elections and the 54.7% who want the Senate to pass the bill outright.

North Carolina is one of the most politically competitive states in the country, having voted for Donald Trump by 3.3 points in 2024 while simultaneously electing Democratic Governor Josh Stein.

The poll confirms that. 92.8% of North Carolina respondents agreed that only U.S. citizens should vote in federal elections. 71.6% said proof of citizenship should be required to register to vote. And 60% called photo ID a reasonable requirement, with only 35.2% calling it an unfair barrier.

North Carolina Republican voters are not interested in political theater. When asked whether they preferred a symbolic vote or a genuine Senate floor fight, 87.4% of Republican voters chose the real fight, including doing away with the filibuster, which democrats expressed they are likely to do the next time they are in power. Only seven percent accepted symbolic action.

North Carolina’s Republican base voted in massive numbers in 2024, helping deliver the state for Trump and electing Jeff Jackson as Attorney General by the narrowest of margins — a reminder of just how close these races run. Depressing that same base by 12% through Senate inaction on the SAVE America Act hurts Republican candidates down ballot.

(RELATED: Gov. Stein Demands Pay Raises While Doing Nothing To Break The Two-Year Legislative Stalemate He Helped Create)

(RELATED: System Failing Iryna Zarutska: Charlotte Light Rail Murder Suspect Dodges Trial On Mental Health Grounds As Family Waits For Justice)

(RELATED: Secretary Mullin Visits Chimney Rock, Announces Millions In New Flood Relief For Hurricane Helene Victims)

North Carolina Governor Josh Stein doesn’t have the votes to pass a budget. He has no concrete plan to break a two-year stalemate that has left teachers without raises and Medicaid on the brink.

Stein appeared Monday at the North Carolina Education Innovation Lab’s annual meeting in Cary, delivering a polished speech about teacher pay and education funding while offering nothing new in the way of actually moving a budget through the Republican-controlled legislature that has the sole authority to pass one.

“Public education is not a Democratic policy,” Stein told the crowd. “Public education is not a Republican policy. It is a North Carolina policy.”

It’s a fine line — but lines don’t pay teachers. Budgets do. And North Carolina hasn’t had one in over two years.

Stein’s proposed spending plan calls for nearly a 6% average raise for teachers, restoration of master’s degree pay supplements, increased compensation for experienced educators, raises for state employees, and a major infusion of cash into Medicaid — which covers roughly one-third of North Carolinians and is rapidly approaching a funding cliff.

The total price tag: $1.4 billion.

What Stein hasn’t explained is how he plans to get any of it passed. The North Carolina Senate holds a Republican supermajority. The House is Republican-controlled. Neither chamber has shown any interest in rubber-stamping a Democratic governor’s spending blueprint — and Stein has offered no serious public strategy for bridging the gap between his wish list and legislative reality.

North Carolina ranks 43rd in the country in teacher pay, with an average salary of $58,292 — nearly $14,000 below the national average of $72,030 and behind every neighboring state including South Carolina (36th) and Tennessee (38th). Teachers deserve better. That much is indisputable.

But Stein’s repeated public appearances lamenting teacher pay while failing to demonstrate any meaningful progress toward an actual budget deal raises a legitimate question: is this governance, or is it campaigning?

A governor who genuinely prioritized teacher raises would be spending less time at annual meetings and more time in closed-door negotiations with Senate leader Phil Berger and House Speaker Destin Hall — the two men who actually control the outcome. There is no public evidence that those conversations are happening with any urgency.

The legislature’s two-year deadlock centers on a dispute over scheduled income tax cuts — a policy disagreement between Republican chambers that Stein has little direct power to resolve. But rather than using his platform to push both sides toward compromise, Stein has largely used it to propose more spending, which does nothing to address the core impasse and may actually harden Republican resistance.

Meanwhile, Medicaid funding is running out. Teachers are leaving for better-paying jobs across state lines. Rural districts are making cuts. And the governor is at a conference in Cary talking about cell phone bans.

(RELATED: System Failing Iryna Zarutska: Charlotte Light Rail Murder Suspect Dodges Trial On Mental Health Grounds As Family Waits For Justice)

(RELATED: Secretary Mullin Visits Chimney Rock, Announces Millions In New Flood Relief For Hurricane Helene Victims)

Several months after a Ukrainian refugee was stabbed to death on a Charlotte light rail train in a killing that shocked the nation, the man charged with her murder may never face trial.

On April 7, the public defender’s office filed a motion revealing that Decarlos Brown Jr. was found “incapable to proceed” following a December mental health evaluation at Central Regional Hospital, a North Carolina state psychiatric facility. The evaluation determined Brown lacks the mental capacity to stand trial in the murder of 23-year-old Iryna Zarutska.

A judge must still formally accept the evaluation’s findings. If the court determines Brown’s mental capacity has been restored, proceedings could resume. But if the judge rules Brown is permanently incapable of standing trial, the charges could be dismissed entirely — leaving Zarutska’s family without the criminal accountability they have waited nearly two years to see.

The Mecklenburg County District Attorney’s Office agreed to delay by 180 days a hearing on whether to seek the death penalty in the case.

Zarutska, 23, was a Ukrainian refugee who had come to the United States seeking safety from war. On the night of August 22, 2024, she boarded a Charlotte Area Transit System light rail train at 9:46 p.m. and sat down in front of Brown. Four minutes later, surveillance cameras captured Brown allegedly stabbing her to death. Brown later claimed he acted because Zarutska was reading his mind.

The graphic video of the attack spread widely, capturing national attention and drawing a response from President Donald Trump. The case became a flashpoint in broader debates about public safety on transit systems and the consequences of inadequate mental health intervention before violence occurs.

Brown’s legal jeopardy extends beyond state court. He was indicted in October on federal charges of violence against a railroad carrier and mass transportation system resulting in death, and is currently held at a federal prison in Illinois. A separate mental health evaluation is also underway in the federal case.

Should Brown ultimately be found competent to stand trial, he could face the death penalty — both on the state murder charge and potentially under federal statutes, further complicated by a 2015 armed robbery conviction.

Legal experts warn that North Carolina’s psychiatric facilities have severely limited capacity, with some defendants waiting more than a year for a bed to open. That bottleneck means Brown could sit in legal limbo indefinitely — neither tried nor treated — while Zarutska’s family waits for a justice system that appears increasingly unlikely to deliver a verdict.

For a woman who fled one of the world’s most brutal conflicts only to be murdered on a commuter train, the prospect of her killer avoiding trial entirely is a failure that demands accountability — from the courts, from the mental health system, and from the public officials responsible for both.