North Carolinians support newly-enacted Republican policies on cashless bail and transgender athletes but oppose some of the Trump administration’s efforts to crack down on illegal immigration, a new WRAL/WSOC Poll found.
The poll — which focused in part on North Carolina voter preferences — delved into topics Republicans are campaigning on across the state. The results offer insight into why the GOP candidates on some issues, but not others.
Immigration enforcement
A plurality of North Carolinians say they oppose efforts to detain undocumented immigrants who have committed no crimes in the United States, according to the WRAL/WSOC Poll. The findings come roughly two years after Trump won North Carolina in the 2024 presidential election while promising to carry out the largest deportation operation in U.S. history.
The poll, conducted from Oct. 7 through Oct. 11 by polling company SurveyUSA, found that 47% of North Carolinians oppose federal immigration officials taking custody of undocumented immigrants “even if they have not been charged with or convicted of another crime.” Thirty-nine percent of respondents supported the idea, while 14% said they weren’t sure.
Support was highest among voters who consider themselves to be very conservative and lowest among voters who said they supported Democrat Kamala Harris in the 2024 presidential election. Among independents, 33% supported the idea and 49% opposed it.
The poll of 900 North Carolina adults was conducted from Oct. 7 through Oct. 11. The poll had a credibility interval of 4.2 percentage points. A credibility interval is similar to a margin of error but takes into account more factors and is considered by some pollsters to be a more accurate measurement of statistical certainty.
Responses to the question about immigration provide some insight into Trump’s approval rating of 37% in North Carolina, which could factor into this year’s midterm elections. Trump won the state in three elections. But he has lost support due to a number of his policies, political analysts say. That is putting pressure on Republican candidates who are running this year.
For instance, Democratic former Gov. Roy Cooper is leading Republican Michael Whatley — a longtime ally of Trump’s — by 14 percentage points in North Carolina’s U.S. Senate race, the WRAL/WSOC Poll found. Whatley’s campaign website says he is “100% supportive of President Trump securing the border and deporting the millions of criminal illegal aliens” that entered under former President Joe Biden.
Trump promised to prioritize deporting the “worst of the worst” immigrants, but analyses of federal data have found that a majority of immigrants in Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention centers have no criminal convictions. It’s possible that North Carolinians believe someone from their community was apprehended unfairly, said Ken Alper, president of Survey USA. “A lot of the campaigning was based on [apprehending] the worst of the worst, and then what people see are: maybe they’re just trying to hit numbers and they’re just kind of indiscriminately grabbing folks,” Alper said.
The WRAL/WSOC poll found that a plurality of North Carolinians — 32% — said immigration enforcement should focus on capturing people convicted of violent or other serious crimes. Meanwhile, 21% said those enforcement efforts should focus on people who have been charged with those crimes — even if they haven’t been convicted — while 23% of respondents said enforcement should be applied regardless of someone’s criminal history. Another 11% said immigration authorities shouldn’t take people into custody solely because they are in the country illegally.
Transgender athletes
The poll also found that a majority of North Carolinians side with the Republican position on transgender athletes in youth sports. A majority of respondents — 54% — said that transgender students should play sports on teams that correspond with their birth gender. That number includes 75% of Republicans, 35% of Democrats and 52% of independents.
The percentage of North Carolinians opposed to the transgender women playing women’s sports is smaller than percentages found in national surveyswhich have found more than two-thirds of Americans opposed to the idea. Alper said his poll likely found less opposition among North Carolinians because they were presented with more than two options.
In 2023, when lawmakers passed a law that blocked transgender girls from playing girls sports, there were about 15 known transgender high school student-athletes in North Carolina, according to the North Carolina High School Athletic Association. There were about 180,000 student-athletes overall who participated statewide in 2022.
Eighteen percent of North Carolina respondents said a student should determine their team “individually” — thus, having the flexibility to choose between the men’s and women’s teams — while 14% said transgender students should play with a team that corresponds to their “current gender identity,” and another 14% said they weren’t sure.
“If you offer an alternative option, people tend to take it, and I think that is a lot of what we’re seeing here,” Alper said.
The issue is appearing in television ads in some of the state’s most competitive races. Whatley has hammered Cooper for vetoing the 2023 bill. Republican state lawmakers overrode his veto and passed the ban into law.
One of the bill’s sponsors, Republican state Rep. Jennifer Balkcom, is now touting the law as one of her signature achievements while running for an open U.S. House seat against Democrat Jamie Ager in the state’s 14th Congressional District, which covers Asheville and western North Carolina.
In northeastern North Carolina, Republicans are criticizing U.S. Rep. Don Davis, D-NC, for skipping votes on the issue. He faces reelection against Republican Laurie Buckhout in a district that the GOP-led state legislature redrew last year to favor Republicans.
Davis didn’t participate in a vote on legislation that would have clarified that Title IX, a federal law that prohibits sex-based discrimination, is based solely on biological sex at birth. In a campaign ad addressing the GOP attacks, Davis said “there’s real concerns about fairness and safety” in youth sports, adding: “That’s why I believe states should decide what’s right for protecting women and girls, and North Carolina has decided.”
Crime crackdown efforts
The WRAL/WSOC Poll also found support for a judicial reform package that state lawmakers approved last year. The package tightens North Carolina’s laws for releasing people from jail when they face certain charges — an effort they launched after the August 2025 death of Iryna Zarutska, a Ukrainian woman who was fatally stabbed on Charlotte’s commuter train.
The package known as “Iryna’s Law” requires stricter scrutiny on judges and magistrates when considering pre-trial release. It bans one type of cashless bail in North Carolina, and makes it easier for people who have a history of mental health issues to be involuntarily committed to a mental hospital after an arrest.
The WRAL/WSOC Poll found a plurality of North Carolinians to be unsure about the state’s new bail laws, though a majority said they believe “Iryna’s Law” reforms are making their communities safer.
Asked whether they approve or disapprove of North Carolina’s bail guidelines for suspected violent offenders, 43% said they’re not sure, while 27% said they approve and 30% said they disapprove. When provided details of Iryna’s Law, 53% said they believe the new rules made North Carolina safer, while 40% said it made no difference and 7% said it made their community less safe.
Republicans were more likely than Democrats or independent voters to say Iryna’s Law made their communities safer. Fifty-eight percent of Republican respondents said the law worked, while 50% of independents and 49% of Democrats held that same view. Some of the provisions of the law aren’t yet in effect.
Whatley has placed public safety issues at the forefront of his U.S. Senate campaign — falsely blaming Cooper for Zarutska’s death — and yet polls have consistently shown Whatley trailing Cooper in the race. That’s because voters are more concerned about their financial situations than they are with crime, said Chris Cooper, a Western Carolina University political scientist who isn’t related to the former governor. The WRAL/WSOC Poll found that the economy is the top issue for voters and that a majority of North Carolinians are unsure or pessimistic about their personal finances in the near future.
“Folks already thought probably that Roy Cooper was worse on crime and safety than Michael Whatley because they think that Democrats are worse than Republicans,” the political analyst said. “So this isn’t really new information for voters. It also ignores that the major issue is the economy.”
Source: www.wral.com
