This story originally published online at NC Newsline.

Democratic Congressman Wiley Nickel announced Thursday he will run for the U.S. Senate rather than seek a second term in the U.S. House after redistricting this year left him with a heavily Republican district. 

Family, friends, campaign supporters, and local politicians gathered in Cary to cheer the announcement that turned into a rally. Nickel offered to pose for photos with supporters with a giant American flag as a backdrop. 

North Carolina’s next US Senate race is in 2026 for the seat that Republican US Senator Thom Tillis now holds.

Nickel is getting an early jump on the race. He said he’d travel the state next year to hear from voters and talk about the problem of extreme partisan gerrymandering. 

Three North Carolina Democrats in the U.S. House have announced that the state legislature’s extreme gerrymandering left them with districts they cannot win. In addition to Nickel, Reps. Kathy Manning of Greensboro and Jeff Jackson of Mecklenburg have announced they will not run for reelection to Congress next year. Jackson is running for state Attorney General. 

Gerrymandering is “eroding the foundation of democracy,” Nickel said. “We’ve got to end partisan gerrymandering. It doesn’t matter who’s doing it, whether it’s Democrats or Republicans, it’s wrong and it’s destroying democracy.”

Under a court-drawn congressional map used in the 2022 elections, North Carolina elected seven Republicans and seven Democrats to Congress. Nickel won in the toss-up 13th District. 

Republican legislators redrew district boundaries for the 2024 election to create 10 strong Republican districts, three solidly Democratic districts and one district considered a toss-up. 

Democratic U.S. Rep. Don Davis represents that toss-up district and has announced he is running again. 

Black and Latino voters filed a racial gerrymandering lawsuit challenging congressional districts, but their lawyers did not ask judges to pause candidate filing while the lawsuit is underway. 

The lawsuit did not claim that the 13th District is racially gerrymandered. 

Nickel served two terms in the North Carolina Senate before he was elected to Congress.

Editor’s note: Due to an INDY editorial error, the republished version of this story originally stated in the sub-headline that Nickel would run for U.S. Senate in 2024. He will run in 2026, as NC Newsline correctly reported.

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