Republican Sen. Thom Tillis is kicking off his 2026 re-election campaign this week. The race could be one of the most closely watched and expensive races in the country in the 2026 midterms.

What You Need To Know

  • Sen. Thom Tillis is kicking off his re-election campaign this week

  • The Republican will be vying for a third term in the Senate

  • The N.C. race will be closely watched in 2026 as Democrats work to flip it blue

The road map for Democrats to take back the U.S. Senate is a rocky one, and if there’s any chance for them in the 2026 midterms it will likely run through North Carolina.

On Wednesday, Tillis will hold a fundraiser with Senate Republicans, officially kicking off his re-election campaign.

It’s not a surprise, but it does come after he told Spectrum News in 2019 he was “unlikely” to run for a third term.

Winning in 2026 will be a challenge for Tillis given North Carolina’s purple status. Democrats will likely invest tens of millions of dollars trying to flip the seat.

No Democrat is officially in the race, but outgoing Rep. Wiley Nickel has expressed interest in running, and a number of names have been floated, most notably outgoing Gov. Roy Cooper.

But it’s not only the general election that will be tough. Tillis could be challenged in the Republican primary.

Hardline Republicans have not been happy with Tillis. They say he’s not conservative enough because of some of his votes to support bipartisan legislation during Joe Biden’s presidency.

The NCGOP censured Tillis last year for some of his votes, including his work to enshrine protections for same-sex and interracial marriages in federal law.

“Thom Tillis is very good at figuring out where the levers of power are and how best to use them. Not just for his career but for his constituents. So he has put himself in a power position in the U.S. Senate, and the way to be in a power position is not to be in the right flank but to be somewhere in the middle. And that’s where Thom Tillis has been,” Western Carolina University politics Professor Chris Cooper said.

No Republican besides Tillis has jumped into the race, but two names to watch include N.C. Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson and President-elect Donald Trump’s daughter-in-law, Lara Trump.

“If I can’t defend myself in a primary after being a two-term member, then I’m not very good at my job,” Tillis told Spectrum News. “The real question is how well are we going to govern. How well are going to come in and support President Trump and fulfill the promises that we’ve made. If we don’t do that, that’s going to be very, very difficult for anybody in the 2026 cycle to be successful, me or anybody else.”