What to know about the high-stakes NC primary between Phil Berger and Sam Page

Dawn Baumgartner Vaughan, The News & Observer on Dec 11, 2025

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If all politics is local, in the case of one North Carolina Senate race, it’s both state and national, too.

North Carolina’s longtime Republican Senate leader Phil Berger is being challenged in a primary election by Rockingham County Sheriff Sam Page.

Both men have praised Trump, but Trump chose to endorse Berger on Wednesday night, even as he complimented Page, offered him a job and encouraged him to drop out of the race.

Page said he isn’t going anywhere and he’s committed to defeating Berger in the March 3 election.

Here’s what you need to know about the status of the primary.

A local primary is the only way that Berger could lose power

Berger has maintained the support of his Senate Republican Caucus, which chooses to keep him as its leader every two-year session. And he serves in a safely Republican district.

“Berger is unquestionably the most powerful state legislator and arguably the most powerful politician in North Carolina and usually skates to reelection,” said political science professor Chris Cooper.

“So the only way that Berger could lose power is in a primary election,” he said. Cooper, who is also director at Western Carolina University’s public policy institute, said that makes this “arguably the most important primary in the past two decades” in the state.

Trump, Sen. Galey asked Page to drop out

On the eve of candidate filing, Republican Sen. Amy Galey went to Page’s house and left him a letter trying to persuade him to get out of the race, Page told The News & Observer on Wednesday. Page says her pitch was that Berger campaign money would be better spent on other Senate Republican campaigns to maintain a supermajority.

But Page filed for office on Dec. 1 anyway, despite the attempt to dissuade him.

Wednesday night, WRAL-TV first reported about the letter and Ring camera photo of Galey, with Galey telling the television station that she “felt really, really strongly — I do feel strongly — that Sheriff Page has made a really big mistake that is going to do a lot of harm to causes that I care about.”

Page told The N&O that Galey, an Alamance County Republican and Senate majority whip, came to his house around 6:30 p.m., after dark and unannounced. He said he told her previously he didn’t want to talk to her about the race, thinking she would then try to persuade him not to run. Page saw footage from his Ring camera of Galey’s visit.

After Trump endorsed Berger, Galey posted on social media an image of Trump’s endorsement with the comment directed to Page to “please disregard my last note.”

But Trump’s endorsement didn’t change Page’s plan. He’s still in the race.

Cooper said that the Berger vs. Page primary is so important because Page, having already won election several times, is “a legitimate challenger.”

The Trump endorsement helps Berger, though, Cooper said, because “as powerful and important as Berger is, Donald Trump is more powerful and more important and more popular.”

“In a primary election, it’s gold,” he said.

What to know about Senate District 26, Berger and Page timeline

Rockingham County is north of Greensboro and along the Virginia state line. The Senate District 26 seat that Berger holds includes all of Rockingham County and part of Guilford County.

Rockingham County has a population of about 93,000 people as of 2024, according to U.S. Census data.

Berger and Page have served Rockingham as elected officials for about the same number of years.

Page was first elected sheriff in 1998.

Berger was first elected to the Senate in 2000, when Democrats were in control. When Republicans took the majority in the 2010 election, he took on his current leadership role as president pro tempore and became one of three top politicians — the other two being the governor and speaker of the House.

Page ran unsuccessfully in the 2024 Republican primary for lieutenant governor, coming in fifth in a field of 11 candidates, with 10% of the vote.

In February, Page announced his run for Senate, setting off months of campaigning even before candidate filing opened. Now it’s official, and heating up.

Berger, who has now served 13 terms in the Senate, is not the only elected official in his family. His son Phil Berger Jr. serves on the N.C. Supreme Court, and in their home county, Berger’s son Kevin Berger is on the Rockingham County Board of Commissioners.

County commissioners oversee funding of sheriff’s offices, and Commissioner Berger has led recent questioning of a vending machine account at the sheriff’s office that is also the subject of an investigation by North Carolina’s State Bureau of Investigation, The N&O previously reported.