All 50 seats in the North Carolina Senate are up for election on November 5, 2024. Heading into the elections, there are 30 Republicans and 20 Democrats in the Senate. One incumbent lost in the primaries. Click here to learn more.

Republicans won a veto-proof majority in the state Senate after the 2022 elections. North Carolina requires a three-fifths vote from both of its legislative chambers to override a gubernatorial veto. Assuming no vacancies, that amounts to 72 of the 120 members in the state House and 30 of the 50 members in the state Senate. In 2023, Republicans also gained a veto-proof majority in the House when Rep. Tricia Cotham switched parties from Democrat to Republican. This means that as Republicans are looking to expand their supermajorities in both chambers in 2024, Democrats are one seat away from breaking them.

Because Gov. Roy Cooper is a Democrat, North Carolina is one of 10 states with a divided government and one of four states with a veto-proof state legislature and an opposing party governor. North Carolina has had a divided government since Cooper assumed office in 2017. Because Republicans also control the House, the outcome of the Senate elections alone can not change North Carolina’s trifecta status. North Carolina will also hold its gubernatorial election on November 5. North Carolina is one of two states, the other being Vermont, where either party could establish a state government trifecta.

The 2024 elections are the first state legislative elections after the General Assembly adopted new district boundaries following the 2020 census. In response to the new state legislative maps, State Rep. Tim Longest (D) said, “This map secures more Republican seats than 100,000 randomly generated maps. That is unexplainable by geography, deliberately designed to maximize advantage.” WUNC’s Rusty Jacobs wrote that “Republican Sen. Ralph Hise, a co-chair of the Senate’s redistricting committee, maintained that the maps were drawn applying traditional redistricting criteria, such as maintaining equal population across districts and minimizing the splitting of municipalities and precincts.” For more on North Carolina’s redistricting process, click here.

Ballotpedia identified 10 Senate battleground districts. Of those seats, Democrats hold six, and Republicans hold 4.

The primary was March 5, 2024, and the primary runoff was May 14, 2024. The filing deadline was December 15, 2023. The North Carolina Senate is one of 85 state legislative chambers with elections in 2024. There are 99 chambers throughout the country.