The short version.
Tyrrell County, North Carolina has 1,934 active registered voters — 22.3% Republican, 38.2% Democratic, and 39.0% with no party affiliation, as of July 2026. Here's what it takes to get on the ballot here.
North Carolina gives every candidate the same choice: pay a filing fee, or collect petition signatures instead. You file a Notice of Candidacy with your county Board of Elections (for N.C. House/Senate and county and local offices) or with the State Board of Elections (for U.S. Senate, U.S. House, judicial offices, and District Attorney).
This page covers how that works for Tyrrell County, including the actual number of signatures you'd need here. It is not legal advice; for the official rules, your county Board of Elections and the North Carolina State Board of Elections are the sources of truth.
Tyrrell County by the numbers.
- 1,934 active registered voters across 6 precincts (official North Carolina voter file, July 2026).
- Party registration: Democratic 38.2% · Republican 22.3% · unaffiliated 39.0% · other parties 0.5%.
- 1,268 supervoters (65.56%, voted in at least 3 of the last 4 November generals). These are the doors reliable-voter campaigns knock first.
- In 2024, Tyrrell County cast 1,752 votes for president: 38.8% Democratic, 60.3% Republican.
Full statistics, registration breakdown, and the most reliable-voting precincts: Tyrrell County voter data.
The campaigns that win the field are the ones who start building their list of supporters and volunteers before qualifying even opens, not after. The Tyrrell County voter file is already loaded in Motion51, so you can start finding your people now.
The two ways to qualify.
Every North Carolina candidate gets the same choice: pay the filing fee, or petition to get on the ballot for free. You don't have to decide early; you can prepare for either.
Option 1: Pay the filing fee.
Under N.C. Gen. Stat. §163-107 the fee is 1% of the annual salary of the office you're seeking, the same 1% for every office, from Governor to county commissioner. The salary used is the office's starting salary. Your board of elections will quote you the exact dollar amount when you file.
Option 2: Petition in lieu of the fee.
Under N.C. Gen. Stat. §163-107.1, you can skip the fee by collecting signatures instead:
- County, local, and district partisan offices: signatures from 5% of the registered voters in the area who are affiliated with your party, or 200 voters, whichever is greater.
- Statewide and appellate offices (U.S. Senate, Governor, Supreme Court, Court of Appeals): a flat 10,000 registered voters of your party.
- Nonpartisan offices (most judicial, school board, many municipal): 5% of all registered voters in the area; any registered voter may sign.
The board checks every signature against the voter rolls, so collect a cushion. Candidates who petition well treat it as a head start on the field operation: every signer is a confirmed registered voter, and every gatherer is a future volunteer.
Signatures you'd need in Tyrrell County.
If you take the petition route for a Tyrrell County office, here's the real math from the county's current registration:
- Democratic primary (partisan office): 5% of 738 registered Democrats = 37, or 200, whichever is greater → about 200 signatures.
- Republican primary (partisan office): 5% of 432 registered Republicans = 22, or 200, whichever is greater → about 200 signatures.
- Nonpartisan county office: 5% of all 1,934 registered voters → about 97 signatures.
- Statewide office (e.g., U.S. Senate): a flat 10,000 registered voters of your party.
Figures use Tyrrell County's current registration as the basis. Confirm the exact number for your specific office with Tyrrell County Board of Elections, which issues official petition forms and signature requirements.
Key North Carolina dates.
Still open for the November 3, 2026 ballot
Every route onto a COUNTY race closed months ago: regular filing at noon on December 19, 2025, the unaffiliated petition at noon on primary day, and the write-in petition at noon on August 5. What is still open is narrower, and it is worth knowing because it needs no paperwork at all.
- No deadline at all WRITE-IN for a MUNICIPAL contest, a Soil and Water Conservation District supervisor race, or a NONPARTISAN board of education contest. No petition, no declaration of intent, no fee: the write-in line is already on those ballots and the only requirement is that you are eligible to hold the office (G.S. 163-123(h)).
- Fri Sep 18, 2026, 12:00 noon COMPUTED unaffiliated petition deadline for a PARTISAN municipal office in a town that holds even-year elections -- noon on the Friday before the seventh Saturday before the election, 1.5 per cent of that town's voters (G.S. 163-296). Narrow: most NC towns are nonpartisan and odd-year.
- Wed Aug 5, 2026, 12:00 noon Write-in declaration of intent plus petition for a COUNTY office -- CLOSED (G.S. 163-123(c)(3), the 90th day).
- Tue Mar 3, 2026, 12:00 noon Unaffiliated petition for a county office, 4 per cent of the county's registered voters -- CLOSED. It fell on primary day (G.S. 163-122(a)(3)).
- Fri Dec 19, 2025, 12:00 noon Regular candidate filing for all county offices -- CLOSED (G.S. 163-106.2(b)).
A vacancy in a party's nomination is filled by that party's county executive committee under G.S. 163-114, not by any application from the public, and where the vacancy did not arise from a death the committee had to certify by today, the 75th day before the election.
2027 is the municipal year; 2028 is the next county ballot
North Carolina runs municipal elections in odd years, and each town chooses its own method -- plurality, nonpartisan primary, election-and-runoff, or partisan -- which is what decides whether there is a September or October round at all (G.S. 163-279).
- Fri Jul 2 to Fri Jul 16, 2027, 12:00 noon COMPUTED municipal filing period (G.S. 163-294.2(c), 163-291(2)). Treat the closing date as hard and the opening date as soft: a town charter or local act can override it, and the State Board has shifted the opening in past years.
- Tue Oct 5, 2027 COMPUTED nonpartisan municipal primary, the fourth Tuesday before the election (G.S. 163-279).
- Tue Nov 2, 2027 COMPUTED municipal general election (G.S. 163-279(a)).
- Mon Dec 6 to Fri Dec 17, 2027, 12:00 noon COMPUTED filing period for ALL 2028 county offices, filed with your county board of elections (G.S. 163-106.2). This is the real county deadline and it is eleven months before the election.
- Tue Mar 7, 2028, 12:00 noon COMPUTED unaffiliated petition deadline for a county office -- noon on primary day, needing 4 per cent of the county's registered voters (G.S. 163-122(a)(3)).
- Tue Mar 7, 2028 COMPUTED 2028 primary (G.S. 163-1(b)); a second primary, if demanded, ten weeks later on May 16.
- Wed Aug 9, 2028, 12:00 noon COMPUTED write-in declaration and petition deadline for a county office -- 100 signatures in a county with 5,000 or more eligible voters (G.S. 163-123(c)(3)). Get the sheets to the county board about two weeks earlier; they need the time to verify.
- Tue Nov 7, 2028 COMPUTED 2028 general election.
Do not assume every county office is up in the same year. Sheriff, clerk of superior court and district attorney were on the 2026 ballot for four-year terms, so they next appear in 2030, not 2028. Register of deeds runs on the presidential cycle in some counties and the midterm cycle in others, and commission seats are staggered by local act. Read your own county board's last filing notice. One concrete gotcha: a sheriff candidate must obtain a Felony Disclosure Statement from the NC Sheriffs' Training and Standards Division BEFORE filing (G.S. 163-106(f)), and that takes days -- it cannot be started at the counter.
The 2026 dates come from the NC State Board of Elections candidate fact sheets and deadlines calendar, read on 2026-08-20. The State Board has published nothing past 2026, so the 2027 and 2028 dates are arithmetic from Chapter 163. The General Assembly has moved North Carolina primary dates by session law before, and a town charter can override the municipal filing window, so re-check with your county board of elections before you rely on any of it.
Offices on the ballot.
Up in 2026 (primary March 3, general November 3):
- U.S. Senate — open seat (Sen. Thom Tillis is retiring)
- U.S. House — all 14 North Carolina seats
- N.C. Senate — all 50 seats
- N.C. House — all 120 seats
- Judicial — Supreme Court, Court of Appeals, and Superior & District Court seats; District Attorneys
- County & local — commissioners, sheriff, register of deeds, clerk of court, school board (varies by county)
The Council of State (Governor and other statewide executives) is not on the 2026 ballot; those are elected in 2028. For the official list of Tyrrell County seats up this cycle, check your county Board of Elections.
Your county Board of Elections.
North Carolina runs elections through 100 county Boards of Elections. Tyrrell County's board is where you file for county, local, and N.C. legislative offices, and the source of truth for local dates, district maps, and petition forms.
- Office
- 403 Main Street, Columbia, NC 27925
- Phone
- (252) 796-0775
- Website
- https://www.townofcolumbianc.com/elections
Contact details verified 2026-06-18. If a field is wrong or out of date, the NC State Board of Elections county-board directory above is the canonical source.
After you qualify: building a field operation.
The paperwork ends the day you file. What starts then is the actual campaign: knocking on doors, recruiting volunteers, and identifying the voters who'll show up for you in the primary and in November.
That's what Motion51 is built for. The Tyrrell County voter file is already loaded: no chasing a CSV or paying a vendor. You scope your district, recruit volunteers, cut turf, and start knocking. The app works offline for neighborhoods with bad cell coverage, and every door is logged with a timestamp.
If qualifying is settled and you're thinking about the field operation, our For Candidates page walks through the next steps.