Roy Cooper enters the Northern Carolina Senate race for the open headquarters in Tillis in 2026

The former Democratic Governor with two Mandates Roy Cooper presents himself for the Senate in the battlefield in North Carolina.

Cooper announced its candidacy Monday morning in the Open-Shee race to succeed the Republican senator Thom Tillis, who announced at the end of the month that he would not present himself to re-election in the mid-term elections of 2026.

“I thought about it and prayed on this subject, and I decided: I run to be the next American Senator in North Carolina,” said Cooper in a Social media message.

The launch of Cooper’s campaign is considered a major coup for the Democratic Party, as it was the best recruit of the party in the elections of next year, strengthening their chances of overthrowing a key seat of the GOP while they are trying to take a big bite from the majority of the Senate of the Republicans 53-47.

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Then-gov. Roy Cooper, a Democrat in Northern Carolina, speaks with journalists on September 10, 2024 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Cooper is now running for the US Senate in the mid-term elections of 2026. (Fox News – Paul Steinhauser)

His announcement was expected because many press organizations, including Fox News, recently reported that the former governor would launch a campaign in the coming days.

And last weekend, at the Northern Carolina Democrats “Unity Dinner”, Cooper praised her race during her speech.

He caught cheers when he asked people to get up if they presented themselves in the elections in 2026 and said: “Hey, I’m not sitting, I’m me.”

Before its launch, the Senate National Republican Committee (NRSC), which is the campaign arm of the GOP Senate, targeted Cooper in a digital announcement.

“Roy Cooper is a democrat lapdog who spent his time as governor sabotaging President Trump, making Joe Biden and Kamala Harris auctions, releasing violent illegal foreigners in the streets of North Carolina and defending the radical transgender ideology”, the communications director of the National Republican Communicate Committee on Monday morning.

Although Cooper is not the only democrat to announce his candidacy – the former representative of a Wiley Nickel mandate launched a campaign in April – he will be instantly considered the first row of the north Carolina party’s appointment.

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Cooper, who was a popular governor during his eight years of management of North Carolina, was launched last year as a possible package for the president of the time, Kamala Harris, after having succeeded the president of the time, Joe Biden as presidential candidate of the Democrats in 2024.

Cooper is expected to compete in the general elections of next year with the president of the National Republican Committee (RNC) Michael Whatley, in what would be one of the most competitive, most competitive and costly Senate battles of 2026.

The president of the National Republican Committee, Michael Whatley, is interviewed by Fox News Digital, at the RNC headquarters in Washington, DC, on July 14, 2025. (Paul Steinhauser – Fox News)

President Donald Trump, who is the ultimate manufacturer of Kings in the GOP policy and whose approvals in the Republican primaries are extremely powerful, gave Whaty his “complete and total approval” on Thursday.

“Mike would make an incredible senator from North Carolina. He is fantastic in everything he does, and he was certainly great at the RNC,” added Trump, in an article on social networks.

And the president of the NRSC, Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina, described Whatley as “Strong America First Conservative who will be a champion of North Carolina in the American Senate.

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Scott noted that “Tar Heel’s state supported President Trump in his three elections and elected Republicans to the two seats in the US Senate for more than a decade. With Michael as a candidate, we will win it again in 2026!”

Trump called Tillis’ announcement last month that he would not seek a third six -year term in the “good news” Senate.

Tillis is a critic of the president’s GOP, and Trump set the senator on last month for not having supported his so-called “big and beautiful” spending and reduction of taxes.

The Republican Senator Thom Tillis of Caroline du Nord announced at the end of June that he would not ask for his re-election during the mid-term elections of 2026. (Getty Images)

Lara Trump, the president’s daughter-in-law of North Carolina who served last year alongside Whatley as a co-president of RNC, was considered Trump’s first choice to present himself for the headquarters of Tillis.

But in a statement on Thursday, Lara Trump said that “after a lot of consideration and sincere discussions with my family, my friends and supporters, I decided not to continue the siege of the American Senate in North Carolina at the moment.”

Whatley, who was president of the Northern Carolina GOP before being elected last year as president of the RNC, recently said in a digital Fox News interview that the Senate’s confrontation in Tar Heel “was going to be one of the country’s marked races”.