The Harris campaign hopes North Carolina will finally deliver

North Carolina will start distributing absentee ballots on September 6th, and as early voting begins, Johnston County is an unlikely battleground. Republican candidates for president have won the last 11 contests here, often handily. Yet Democrats increasingly see this part of the state as contested territory. Population growth in exurban counties and the state’s peculiar political demography mean that Democrats cannot afford to overlook small towns and the countryside, while Republicans can no longer take them for granted.