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House District 86

Burke County · 2026
Likely R
Partisan baseline (2024)
R+38.5
runs 36.8 pts more Republican than NC overall · moving toward Republicans since 2018
2024 result
R+44.0
won by Blackwell (R)
Wesley E. Hendrix
Democrat · Candidate
  • Pastor at Mount Zion Missionary Baptist Church.
  • He holds an associate degree in human services from Davidson-Davie Community College.
Rep. Hugh Blackwell
Republican · Incumbent
  • Retired attorney serving as the state House member for Burke County.
  • US Army Reserve veteran serving his ninth term in the NC House.

Election night results

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Live returns and a precinct map for this race on Nov. 3.

Early voting

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Ballots cast so far in this district, in person and by mail. Updated every morning.

Who lives here

The people of House District 86, from the Census American Community Survey (2020-2024). The dark tick on each bar marks North Carolina overall.

Median household income
$59,005
NC
▼ vs NC · NC $75k
Bachelor's degree or higher
21%
NC
▼ vs NC · NC 36%
Poverty rate
16%
NC
▲ vs NC · NC 13%
Homeownership
75%
NC
▲ vs NC · NC 67%
Unemployment
4.4%
NC
▼ vs NC · NC 4.7%
Uninsured rate
11%
NC
▲ vs NC · NC 10%
Top communities: Morganton 58% · Connelly Springs 13% · Valdese 11% · Hickory 8% · Drexel 2%

Who registers vs. who votes

Each group's share of registered voters against its share of those who actually voted in 2024. About 61k voters are registered here; 45,897 voted in 2024.

White
88%
91%
Black
5.5%
4.9%
Hispanic
2.8%
1.9%
Asian
1.6%
1.0%
American Indian
0.2%
0.2%
Other
1.8%
0.9%
Registered (2024)Voted (2024)
Voter race and ethnicity are self-reported at registration; voters without a designation (6% here) are excluded from the voted-side shares. Source: NCSBE voter file, 2024.

How this seat has moved

Actual result (solid)MRPI composite (dashed)Shaded = midterm
Hollow points are estimates, not measured results: 2022 (100% estimated) modeled - no contested legislative race covered enough of this ground to measure, so most of the value is estimated from statewide races on the same ballot. See Methodology.

How far this district swings

Across these cycles the Democratic share of the two-party vote here has ranged from 28% to 35%.

Precinct detail

31 precincts.

About this seat

HD-86 is rated Likely R from its 2024 partisan baseline of R+38.5. Districts this far from even are not competitive in a typical cycle - the outcome tracks the district’s underlying partisanship rather than individual campaigns. Republicans have gained 3.4 points of vote share here since 2018, moving the seat’s two-way margin 6.7 points their way.

Campaign money

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Hendrix (D) $0 cash$35K cash Blackwell (R)
Blackwell has a committee on file; Hendrix has no machine-readable figures (nothing filed yet, or filed on paper). Raised this cycle: Hendrix $0 / Blackwell $160K.
Actual legislative results, observed except where marked · NCSBE 2018–2024 · boundaries: Redistricting Data Hub (redistrictingdatahub.org) · demographics: Census ACS 2020–2024 · voter file: NCSBE
Data as of October 29, 2026 · campaign finance last refreshed August 20, 2026
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