A fatal stabbing on a North Carolina train allegedly carried out by a twice-deported Honduran national has pushed immigration to the forefront of the state’s 2026 Senate contest. Republican candidate Michael Whatley has used the case to attack former Governor Roy Cooper’s immigration record, while the incident has also drawn public comment from former President Donald Trump.
The alleged fatal stabbing of a passenger on a train in Charlotte, North Carolina, by Oscar Gerardo Solorzano-Garcia, a twice-deported Honduran national who is in the country illegally, has intensified national attention on immigration and crime, according to reporting by The Daily Wire.
Trump weighed in on his social media platform, Truth Social, writing: “Another stabbing by an Illegal Migrant in Charlotte, North Carolina,” and asking, “What’s going on in Charlotte? Democrats are destroying it, like everything else, piece by piece!!!” as quoted by The Daily Wire.
North Carolina had already emerged as a key battleground in the national immigration debate before the attack. The Department of Homeland Security has been running an enforcement effort in the region known as “Operation Charlotte’s Web,” which has resulted in more than 400 arrests so far, according to local outlet WBTV as cited by The Daily Wire.
Michael Whatley, a Republican Senate candidate in North Carolina and former Republican National Committee chairman, told The Daily Wire that the Biden-era border surge has effectively made “every state, including North Carolina, into border states.”
Whatley is expected to face Democrat Roy Cooper, North Carolina’s former governor, in what is projected to be one of the most competitive Senate races of 2026, The Daily Wire reports. If elected, Whatley said he would push to ensure Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the U.S. Border Patrol are fully funded.
He also criticized Cooper’s immigration record, pointing to the Democrat’s veto last November of House Bill 10, a measure that would have required sheriffs to cooperate with ICE. Cooper’s veto was later overridden by the North Carolina General Assembly, according to state legislative records cited in the Daily Wire report. “He has set up a revolving door for criminals in North Carolina,” Whatley said. “He is fighting harder for criminals and illegal aliens than for his own constituents as governor.”
A spokesman for Cooper’s campaign pushed back, telling The Daily Wire that Cooper is “the only candidate who spent his career prosecuting violent criminals and keeping thousands of them behind bars as attorney general, and signing tough-on-crime laws and stricter bail and pretrial release rules as governor.”
Framing the broader stakes of the 2026 contest, Whatley said a Senate vote would ultimately be “a vote for the president and his agenda, or it’s gonna be a vote for Bernie Sanders and Chuck Schumer and the rest of the card-carrying woke mob that Roy Cooper belongs to,” according to the interview.
Responding to suggestions that some Trump supporters might be surprised by the intensity of immigration enforcement efforts, Whatley pointed to campaign materials that said “Mass Deportation Now” and argued that voters had clearly endorsed tougher measures. “The fact is, the American people voted for security. They voted for safe communities and safe kids, right? They voted to shut down the border. They voted to deport violent, criminal, illegal aliens,” he said.
“Whatley added that Trump had made his intentions on immigration clear during the campaign. Any voter who backed him on those issues, he argued, should have expected forceful action. He also suggested that some of the demonstrations taking place around the country are being organized by paid activist groups.
Looking ahead to 2026, Whatley said he expects immigration and the economy to be the dominant issues for voters. “We need the economy to be clicking. I think ultimately the economy is the most important factor when people vote, right? We need to create jobs, we need to raise wages, we need to lower costs,” he told The Daily Wire, adding that, in his view, “all signs right now are pointing towards us having a very strong, robust economy.”
