Some Republicans are increasingly concerned that two key Senate elections once considered essential to retaining their majority are slipping away.
In more than a dozen interviews with campaign officials, senators and operatives, there is acknowledgment that North Carolina and Georgia appear less competitive than the party had anticipated and that decisions must be made quickly about whether to continue investing, even as party officials insist they are not moving away from their candidates in those states.
Republican senators, like North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis, have said it’s time for the party to make tough spending decisions.
“You spend the money where we get Republicans elected,” Tillis said. “I want them to do it now. I mean you don’t spend money just because you want to help someone.”
Rep. Mike Collins, who is trying to unseat Georgia Sen. Jon Ossoff, and Michael Whatley, who is running against former Gov. Roy Cooper to replace Tillis, are trailing in the polls and facing questions about their campaigns. A GOP loss in North Carolina — a state won three times by President Donald Trump — would give Democrats one of four twists and turns they need to take back the Senate.
A GOP super PAC, Old North Action, cut its advertising bookings in North Carolina by about a third last week, one of the clearest signs yet that the party may be losing confidence in the race. Whatley said this week he felt “very comfortable” and would have the money he needed.
“I don’t know what the path forward is for Michael. I mean, I’ll just say that. Unless Cooper completely stumbles,” a North Carolina Republican strategist told CNN, speaking on the condition of anonymity to freely discuss the political environment.
Collins’ campaign has recently made it clear to allies that she needs more help in Georgia. In a memo posted on its website dated Monday, the campaign said one in ten voters were “still up for grabs” for Collins. The campaign said these are mostly voters who supported Trump in 2024 and who support Rick Jackson for governor, who is in a tighter race with Democrat Keisha Lance Bottoms.
“They should vote for Mike Collins, and they don’t yet, mainly because they don’t have a strong opinion of him,” the memo said, suggesting that increased ad spending could change that.
But the party and its allies must spend big to shore up even redder seats, including an investment of more than $100 million in Texas.
“We’re putting up a big wall around all of our nominees,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune said. “We are facing headwinds in all races across the country.”
Party leaders are sending signals that they are still committed to Georgia and North Carolina in particular. Thune headlined a fundraiser for Collins Thursday night in Atlanta with Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp. And Trump and Vice President JD Vance each recently visited North Carolina as part of their first stops for the candidates after the GOP midterm convention.
An NRSC spokesman, Nick Puglia, criticized Ossoff and Cooper in a statement on the story and promised that Republicans “will continue to work to expose their far-left backgrounds in order to permanently retire them.”
NRSC Chairman Sen. Tim Scott on Thursday pushed back against any suggestion that the committee would deprioritize Georgia and North Carolina. “This is rubbish!” Scott wrote about X.
His denial came after a closed-door meeting with Senate Republicans in which he discussed the Senate map. An NRSC spokesperson said Scott spoke positively about Collins and Whatley, saying they were narrowing their polling deficits.
A crisis of confidence – and reproaches to Trump
But confidence is waning in other corners of the Republican Party.
Texas Sen. John Cornyn, who hosted a fundraiser Monday for a group of Republican Senate candidates in other states, questioned the party’s decision to continue pouring money into races that could no longer be won.
“We’re there, what, 40 days? And so I don’t think there’s much to be done,” Cornyn said. “I think it will be a question of where resources should be deployed.”
Cornyn’s fundraiser, which he led with former President George W. Bush, sent a clear message about his vision for the card. The guest list included incumbents and candidates from Alaska, Ohio, Michigan, Iowa, New Hampshire and Minnesota. Collins and Whatley were not there. Notably, Cornyn also excluded Republican Senate candidate Ken Paxton, the Texas attorney general who beat him in a primary this year after securing a late endorsement from Trump.
He said he focused his fundraising on other states “because I think the money will go a lot further in those places.”
Cornyn said he doesn’t think Whatley can do anything to turn around his campaign at this point.
“I think if Thom Tillis was on the list, things would be a lot different, but the president basically went after him, and now we have someone who’s not as well-known and he’s struggling,” Cornyn said.
Whatley painted an optimistic picture of his campaign during a recent radio interview in which he was asked about outside funding.
“We certainly need groups, you know, like the Republican Party to come out and support us … because the Democratic Party is going to send hundreds of millions of dollars to North Carolina,” Whatley said Thursday. “But I am confident that we will have the resources we need over the next 42 days to continue this campaign and win.”
Yet speaking with CNN, several GOP operatives in North Carolina questioned Whatley’s campaign strategy in the current environment, noting that ads and campaign events supporting the former North Carolina GOP and RNC chairman have focused primarily on crime. Meanwhile, Cooper, a two-term governor who never lost a race, focused his campaign on affordability and economic issues.
“I thought the criminal cases would be effective, that some of the bad things he did in office would come back to bite Cooper. That should be a really good message. But, for whatever reason, he hasn’t landed yet,” the Republican Party strategist said. “But they don’t do anything else. Even when the president came, he mainly focused on crime. That doesn’t resonate, we should do something else.”
Outside of Old North Action, Republican groups have mostly maintained their ad reservations for the final weeks of the races and the NRSC, the Senate GOP’s campaign arm, has already spent $7.9 million in coordinated spending in North Carolina and $3.6 million in Georgia through the end of August.
The optimistic argument for Republicans is that North Carolina has a reputation for making late decisions. Trump focused heavily on the state in the final days of the 2024 election, implying he cares about it. He then won by 3 percentage points.
“These polls look really tough,” the North Carolina Republican Party strategist said of this year’s Senate race. “The good thing is that Republicans always outperform the polls. But never this much.”
Cooper’s campaign, meanwhile, has long urged Democrats not to get too complacent about the state. They were particularly outspoken after a Supreme Court ruling lifted limits on coordinated spending with political parties, giving the Republican National Committee — which Whatley previously led — more flexibility to spend in races.
“A Democrat hasn’t won statewide federal office here in almost two decades,” Cooper campaign manager Jeff Allen told CNN in a statement. “Whatley’s elite connections in Washington mean Republicans will spend whatever it takes to hold on to this seat.”
In Georgia, Collins faces a stronger-than-expected incumbent, Ossoff, who is already generating buzz as a potential 2028 presidential candidate. (Ossoff said he has “no interest.”)
Thune told CNN shortly before his trip to Atlanta that he still believed Collins could win.
“I think part of the reason is that it’s a big state, an expensive state and … we have a House member running, and it takes a lot of money to get his name out there,” Thune said. “I think once you get the identity name, you can challenge the contrast.”
“It’s like everywhere else,” Thune added. “It’s a question of resources.”
Thune’s fundraiser for Collins, which was also attended by Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, brought in more than $400,000 for the candidate, according to a source familiar with the event.
Like Cooper, Ossoff is also wary of Democrats who declare victory too soon. He told CNN earlier this week that he “takes nothing for granted.”
“We’re still seeing significant Republican super PAC activity,” Ossoff told CNN. “As far as national groups and so on, again, every day I run like I’m behind.”
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