Incumbent GOP Sen. Richard Burr kept his seat in North Carolina by defeating Democratic challenger Deborah Ross.
Burr won the hard-fought race against Ross, a former executive director of the North Carolina ACLU, after holding a slight edge in polling for much of the final month.
The presidential race weighed heavily down ticket in the Tar Heel State. When Burr and Ross debated in October, video of Donald Trump talking about using his celebrity status to sexually take advantage of women was a leading topic. Burr continued to support Trump throughout all of the GOP nominee’s controversies, and emerged victorious on Election Day.
Burr successfully convinced voters to keep him in office and may have benefited from some split-ticket voting. He and and Ross disagreed sharply over issues of LGBT rights and criminal justice and race, and Burr favors a hardline conservative stance on the issue of immigration.
The Republican incumbent’s victory is critical for the party’s chances of keeping the Senate. Whether the North Carolina race will prove determinative for the balance of power in the Senate remains to be seen.
