Critical midterm showdown: Budd bests Beasley in NC showdown for U.S. Senate

RALEIGH — Republican Ted Budd has won North Carolina’s U.S. Senate seat over Democrat Cheri Beasley, ABC News is reporting.

The race was one of the most closely watched midterm contests in the country as the candidates vied to replace Sen. Richard Burr, a Republican who announced he’d retire at the end of his term.

Budd, a three-term congressman representing the 13th District, appears poised to head back to Washington D.C. as a senator, according to unofficial ballot totals.

Beasley, a former chief justice of the North Carolina Supreme Court, fell short for the second time in a recent statewide election. In 2020, she lost a bid for a full term as chief justice by just 401 votes.

While statewide elections in North Carolina are usually closely divided, Democrats have had a poor run for the Senate in the 21st century. Republicans have won seven of the eight Senate elections, with only Democrat Kay Hagan coming out on top in 2008.

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Beasley outraised Budd by a roughly 3-to-1 margin leading up to the campaign’s final weeks, but national Democrats weren’t as generous as Republican counterparts were toward Budd in helping her cause.

Libertarian Shannon Bray and Green Party candidate Matthew Hoh also were on Tuesday’s Senate ballot. Bray received more than 45,000 votes and Hoh tallied more than 25,000.

The Associated Press contributed to this story.

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